Has anyone not seen the photo above, of the coolest, most gorgeous card catalog we have ever seen?  The proportions of it are part of what I love so much, but it still baffles me how they managed to construct it lengthwise and still end up with a sturdy piece.  I’ve been in love with this piece for years, so when my mother came across an antique spice cabinet at an estate sale, she bought it for me and I tried my own hand at transforming a card catalog.

The Antique Spice Cabinet

This piece was a pretty amazing discovery.  It had been altered by someone else before we got our hands on it, but what they did hadn’t damaged it at all. Without the machine printed labels, this would have been pretty cool just as it was.  Unfortunately, the labels had affixed themselves to the wood, and cleaning them off with furniture polish didn’t work to remove the writing.  I felt that the modern printed letters on such an old piece just didn’t belong, so I opted for a total makeover.

Prepping the Piece

The glass knobs actually were threaded to fit right into the holes.  And the glass pieces over the labels were glued on and peeled off quite easily.  It had clearly been painted at one point, and stained at another.  After removing the knobs and labels, I began sanding.  In order for the paint to stick, I had to sand it down first.  Paint never sticks to a smooth surface.  I used a palm sander like this one, and if you are into refinishing furniture, you will probably get good use out of it if you decide to purchase one.

Filling Holes

After removing the glass knobs, I was left with some pretty serious holes.  I filled them using bondo.  It took more than one application.  Since I had a larger area to work with, I needed to fill the holes, scrape the surface smooth with a paint scraper, and then wait to let it dry.   Then I sanded.  After drying, the bondo had sunken in a little bit, so I had to repeat the process.

Painting

I wanted this same deep blue that I saw in the inspiration image.  So, I chose a semi gloss Hale Navy from the Benjamin Moore Historical Colors Collection.  I used an angled 1-1/2″ wide paintbrush and did the whole thing by hand.  It didn’t take that long.

The Hairpin Legs

The legs in the inspiration photos are classic midcentury hairpin legs, and you can buy a set on Amazon.  Be sure to measure first because you will be surprised how tall things end up if you just guess.  In this case, I tried originally screwing the legs directly into the base.  But the wood was too old, soft and brittle.  I needed to add small corner support pieces to the four underside corners before screwing the legs into those.  It was necessary to paint these the same color so they didn’t stand out.

The Hardware

I went to ebay to find the hardware and it shipped from China.  It took about 3-6 weeks.  There is a fairly good selection and they give you the exact dimensions.  I would recommend holding a ruler up to the piece and imagining the hardware on it.  In this case, the hardware I chose was quite small relative to the size of the drawers.  But on the inspiration image, the hardware is very large compared to the drawer faces.  It’s all a matter of preference. 

The Final Product

And here it is!  All finished, this is how the piece turned out.  I think it’s a great imitation card catalog sideboard.  And I have to admit, we can fit a lot more things in these drawers than you can in the average card catalog drawer.  We couldn’t bear to sell it along with the trailer, so it came with us and it also looks great in the Farmhouse!  If there’s anything you have questions about or if you think I left something out, please let me know in the comments below.