A client received delivery of a dining room console we had ordered a few months back and she had a immediate decor freak-out, resulting in her husband spending the weekend repainting their dining room. Now she was looking at three different colors of wood: The new console and dining set, both in Walnut, and her mid-century blonde wood hutch. She couldn't deal with it. Sleepless nights. Distracted days. Something had to change. And fast.
I was familiar with the hutch (I think she calls it a break-front). She inherited it from her family home in Southern California. Not at all valuable, the piece has significant sentimental value to her and her husband. And definitely has some funky, early 50s soul—a buffet style base with both drawer and cabinet storage set under a high top that opens down the middle (hence the term "break-front") to reveal a *groovy* bar area for liquor storage and ample shelves for cocktail and wine glasses.
She has the original Tomlinson tag, stating that the piece was made of six rare woods blended to complement “the utility of modern and the warm grace and interest of traditional.” The wood is yellowish with pale gray wood grain. Not sure about the six woods part but I guess that the yellowish hue came from 60+ years of basking in San Diego sunshine. Oddly enough, the piece looked ok just days before when the dining room was painted yellow, but now that the walls were a cool White Oak (Benjamin Moore OC-20) it was definitely wrong.
"So what are the options?" she asked. Or sort of demanded.
The two Walnut pieces were basically brand new, so it was the hutch that needed to be refreshed. She asked if I thought refinishing was possible, but with the age of the piece and their modern design preference, I knew that painting it was the way to go.
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