It’s not every day you acquire a nice big chest It’s garbage day in my neighbourhood, which means that there are items to salvage from people’s curbs. Someone took the rickety old ladder I threw out last night. And this morning when I was walking to the subway and checking out people’s discards idly on the way, I came across a wooden chest that someone was throwing out. →[More:]

Right now in my attic workroom I’m using an old dresser and a laundry hamper to store my sewing supplies, fabric, and yarn in, and my plan was to eventually put the dresser and hamper in one of the bedrooms and get a chest and one of those wicker dressers with basket drawers for storage. I’ve been keeping an eye out for a chest for the attic with no luck so far. The only ones that have turned up at Value Village are in very rough shape and/or irredeemably ugly. Buying one new would cost hundreds of dollars at the least.

So I then find this chest. It’s made of wood, and upholstered in a faded, ragged brocade velour. It has nicely turned wooden legs that have most of their black paint worn off. It has metal ring handles at both hands, and a fancy little filigree detail around the lock. All it needs is to be reupholstered in a nice fabric and to have the legs painted or refinished and it’ll be a lovely piece.

I had been on my way to work and had a very brief argument with myself about how I’d be late if I stopped to take the chest back to Swan’s End. But I had left home fifteen minutes earlier than usual and I simply could not pass up this chance. I’d never find another half as nice. So I got on with the task of getting it home. It was awkward. With someone to help, it would have been a breeze, because it wasn’t that heavy and we could have carried it by the handles. Alone, it was a more problematic task. My arms are long but not quite long enough that I could get them around the chest, and it couldn’t be dragged without damaging the legs. I wasted quite a lot of time trying to find a good way to carry it. Eventually I just had to clasp it to me as best I could and lug it twenty steps, rest, then lug it twenty steps more. Finally I reached home, noting on the way that someone was inspecting the old stereo my next door neighbours had tossed out, and hauled the chest up the porch steps and into the house.

I just put the chest inside the door, ran upstairs to wash up a little in the bathroom, and then hurried back out of the house to the bus stop.

And I can’t wait to get to work on that chest. I’ve got some upholstery fabric (cream with wavy narrow green and yellow stripes) I bought for the guest room and didn’t end up using in there that I think could work well for the chest if there’s only enough of it. And since I’ll be painting the old dresser and some other furniture cream, there should be enough of that paint left to do the legs in cream, although I might also strip the legs down and varnish them in honey pine varnish, which I also have around from doing another project. So, it’s a basically a freebie. Yay for me and my chest!