Upcycled Dresser turned TV Console

One of the major issues that we had in our family room was the placement of the TV.

When we moved into this house 8 months ago, we had the movers place our two large armours that we used for kid storage on a wall in the family room without any kind of real plan. {other than getting them to unload the truck as fast as they could, ha!}

 

Yeah..... they didn't survive the move so well so moving them again (even to just another wall) was out of the question. {they were just a bunch of cheap ones we picked up at Ikea one day, so I am not too surprised :) }

 

The armours held our TV, for the {misguided} belief that we would be able to just hide them behind the doors when not in use.

 

The doors were always open.

 

{this is the only pic I could find...don't mind the little guy yelling at me! And look, you can even see a glimpse of our Elfa storage system pre-redo!)

 

These big, clunky pieces of furniture also dictated our floor plan for quite some time, because I wanted to the sofa across from the TV.

 

Then one day I watched, I mean really observed, how the kids used the space.

They never sat on the couch to watch TV. They always just sat on the ground. It was then that the light clicked and I realized that I didn't have to have the TV be the focus of the room.

 

Duh, right??

 

That night it was decided that the armours had to go (although they were great storage, they were just falling apart) and that I had to find something to replace it.

 

I loved the idea of having a dresser act as a TV console. The drawers would make great storage and we would be able to hang the television above it.

 

Then one day I stumbled upon this hot mess beauty:

 

{pardon the paint - I never took a really good before pic!}

 

This beast was solid wood, in good (working) condition and had me at the $4.99 price tag. (I actually nagged it for EVEN cheaper because I had a coupon!)

 

It had no drawer pulls, which was fine since I can pretty much guarantee whatever was on this would have never stayed, ha!

 

I wanted a  pop of color for this piece, and Jason suggested orange, which I thought was perfect.

 

I knew I wanted to do some kind of detail in the middle, so I sketched up a few ideas...

 

...and got to taping!

 

The gray accents match the gray on the desk tops. But when we took the tape off, it just wasn't working:

 

We decided to add some more color, and that addition was the perfect thing to create the standout piece we needed!

 

I choose simple drawer pulls since I wanted the dresser to be the standout.

 

The drawers are a really good size {and there are NINE of them!}. They hold all our games, extra art supplies, and the kid's computers. The smaller ones house all the kid's video games, wii remotes, and dvd's.

 

The biggest thing for me, was having the TV mounted (with a swivel, so it can rotate to face the sofa if needed!) and wires hidden. As well as the wall mounted cover, I had Jason build a special little box that is hidden behind all the components to house our surge protectors and wires. Ready for a moment of Zen?

 

Not to mention it's so much safer now that the kids can't tip it over. Happy mommy over here :)

 

Here's a little look back to see the progression of this {now} amazing piece of furniture:

 

I have to say, one of my favorite parts about this room is all the COLOR we got a chance to use. I would probably never use all this color anywhere else, but for this room, it's absolutely perfect :)

 

 

Check back after this weekend, because I am finally going to show you how the entire project turned out!!

 

****Update: you can now check out the entire Family Room Reveal here!! ****

 

 

Happy Weekend!

 

xo,

Rachel

 

 

 

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