Folding table to games table hack
I saw this old formica folding table and thought surely I can do something fun with that! I remember my aunt having one of these in her kitchen, closed it’s a perfect breakfast table and open up the sides when you have more guests.My table is still useable for your cup of coffee and croissant in the morning but the fun starts when you fold it out as one side is a backgammon board and the other one a snakes and ladders field.The table is ready for a game whenever you fancy it!
The formic table was very easy to paint with Chalk Paint ®, I gave the table a good clean with soapy water first and when it was dry, two coats of the Original paint.
The main table piece has Matisse inspired abstract figures painted on it, for these I used the new Annie Sloan detail brushes, great for when you want to paint swirls, straight lines and other shapes by hand without having to get the masking tape out. Paint a few shapes, let these dry and then paint some more figures that are slightly overlapping the first ones. Just keep going until you have a table top that suits your style. I used the colours Duck egg blue, Henrietta, Emile, Florence, Barcelona Orange. Scandinavian Pink and Arles for all the details and the playing fields.
For the backgammon board I made a little template out of cardboard just so that all the triangles would be the same size. trace your template with pencil and fill the shapes in with paint. I used Scandinavian Pink and Henrietta with a slight accent of Arles. Once the paint was dry I used a marker (Sharpie) to outline the triangles.
Draw on your snakes and ladders board with a marker and paint in the numbers (I used Duck egg blue) then add your snakes and ladders using your accent colours (Emile, Arles, Barcelona Orange, Florence)
When all the paint is dry give the whole table a coat of Annie Sloan Chalk paint Lacquer.
Have your diner and then flap open the sides of the table for a quick game of snakes and ladders, what's not to love? :)
If you don't like backgammon or snakes and ladders you can of course paint on any game you like. Maybe a chess board or a personalised Monopoly board?
This table hack is a project for my Painter in residency for Annie Sloan see more details on this make and all my other projects on Annie's website.
What do you think of my little table? Which games would you paint on the sides?
