The Importance of Primer

I love painting furniture, my favorite is transforming vintage furniture into an updated pieces for my home. Regardless of many paint makeovers I've done or will do, I'm always amazing by the power of primer and paint! In my experience when your refinishing vintage furniture its so important to use primer before painting. I was asked by KILZ® to   review their KILZ® Premium Primer along with sharing my thoughts on why its important to prime. I've been blogging for a while and really looked forward to putting together this post sharing my thoughts why I think its important to use a primer. 





I'm currently in the process of refinishing a pair of vintage solid wood nightstands for my bedroom. The nightstands had a prior paint job that was in bad shape with uneven paint and chipping plus they were pretty dirty. The KILZ® Premium Primer is perfect to use when working on older furniture, its stain-blocking and requires little to no sanding between coats. KILZ® offers several types of primers to help you achieve a professional finished after, click here for a list of their primers that will work best with your project. Here's a reminder of our vintage nightstands before priming. Like I said, dirty and scuffed up. 



Before priming the nightstands, I removed the hardware and cleaned the nightstands with warm soapy and water. Next, I gave the nightstands a good sanding and wiped away any dust with a lint free cloth. The KILZ® Premium Primer went on nice and smooth. Once the primer dried it created a nice smooth surface and covered up the stains. When priming or painting, I always keep an extra lint free cloth on hand to wipe away any drips, just a quick painting tip. 

Since the nightstands were previously painted off white, I only applied one coat primer which still gave full coverage. I'm really impressed by the full coverage the KILZ® Premium Primer with only one coat. The primer also help cover help the previous wonky paint job. Often times while working on older furniture that's full of blemishes, old stains can bleed though the painted finish when you use the wrong primer or none at all. I feel that using a primer helps create a great foundation for a stunning after. Here's my nightstand after one coat of primer, already looking amazing.





Now that our nightstands are primed, they now have a nice smooth foundation for paint. I picked out a pretty soft white for the nightstands and will be painting this weekend. Already looking forward to sharing the after next week! 

What are you thoughts on using a primer? Is primer also a must for you when it comes to refinishing vintage furniture?