Vintage Inspired Plank Tabletop Tutorial

I have had several questions asking for a tutorial on how we made

 the wood plank tabletop for my vintage table that I shared
the other day.
If you missed it- the post is HERE

This table had glass on it originally that ended up being broken...
a casualty of the snow and pergola incident...

I wasn't sure just how I was going to fix it- 

get new glass for it or come up with something else.

Well, we went with something else.

This was such an easy project and took maybe an hour start to finish. 

The paint drying was probably what took the longest!

Here's how we did it:

We always seem to have random wood leftover from projects so instead 

of running to the hardware store and grabbing wood for a top

I thought it might be fun to make a tabletop out of random widths of wood

for a bit of a rustic charm.

We gathered a bunch of different pieces that were old project leftovers, or extras, etc.

 Rough sawn exterior trim, 

furring strips, several different widths of 1x pine

 and even a piece of old grooved knotty pine that was

 on one of the walls in our house. 

We choose pieces for various reasons

and their texture or the character

I wanted the boards to run the width- not the length and so we 

  cut all the boards to the width of the table- 

This table is 31" wide (we added a little for overhang on each side.)

Stacking one next to the other

  the boards were adjusted and tinkered with until the randomness made sense.

Taking 3 ~ 1x2's cut to the length of the table-

 each tabletop board was secured to the 1x2 to hold it in place

(from underneath or from up top and then you can flip your tabletop 

so that the strips are underneath)

*Make sure the screws are not too long- you don't want them to pop up through the top.*

Once the tabletop was built and secured-

 it was time for a little paint!

I chose my good old basic white semi-gloss paint and

  watered a bit of it down so that it was more of a thick whitewash.

 I gave the top 2 light coats with the white and then did a dry brushing with

 a little french linen chalk paint.

Since I was looking for an aged look to the boards

  the next step was sanding. 

Using a coarse grit sandpaper-

 I sanded the edges of each of the boards to round them

and then sanded the tops to take off some of the paint.

I concentrated on sanding more heavily on the knot holes or grooves in the boards

 and in between them the most.

So that's about it!!

Super easy and quick- that's my kind of afternoon project!!

 I love the random edges showing

 &
 how each board is different in texture, finish, and distressing...

but all together
 they create a beautiful rustic tabletop for an old vintage table.

Sharing at
Romantic Homes

Funky Junk Interiors

It's so Very Cheri

See you this afternoon for Feathered Nest Friday!!