Hand Painted Furniture to Inspire An Artful Home

In an era of mass production and look-alike décor, one stand-out piece of decorative furniture can bring a touch of real distinction to any room. Beautiful hand painted furniture will add art and beauty to any room in your home. It returns us to a more elegant time when surface decoration of home furnishings was a way to express personality and taste, as well as create a focal point in the room.

Depending on the design and the style, hand painted furniture can add a touch of elegance or whimsy to any room in which you choose to display it. On this page, you'll find a showcase of beautiful hand painted chests and armoires, tables and chairs, beds, bookshelves, and so much more, in a variety of styles from the playful contemporary to delicate vintage inspired by old European and Empire furniture, through to pieces of stunningly ornate Chinoiserie. You're sure to find furniture to love in the selection of hand painted pieces available here!

One of my favorite pieces of hand-painted furniture is the small side table. It's easy to pick up an inexpensive table of some sort at a yard sale, then get creative with your paints.

For example, I once reworked an incredibly tacky faux-wood end table into a fun piece for the front porch by doing a "fantasy finish" inspired by the beautiful patterns of marble, but in a bright coral pink. It was predominantly done with layers of tone-on-tone color applied with a natural sea sponge, accented with a hint gold metallic craft paint for fine veining, just touched in with a feather when the main paint effect was nearly dry. The original trailer-park-style piece was something I just couldn't live with, but the hand-painted version has graced my front porch for more than a decade, and I'm still enjoying it.

Could you do something similar, perhaps inspired by the beautiful pieces like this?

Here are just a few more hand-painted tables you might love to own, or that may give you inspiration for your own DIY projects. There are so many different styles and approaches, there's certain to be something that appeals to you - and the beauty of taking on a small piece like this is that it's almost as much an artwork as a furniture item, so you don't have to get too hung up on what matches in with your existing décor - just go with whatever "speaks" to you!

A wonderful thing about a striking hand-painted piece of furniture, when you're decorating on a fairly tight budget (and who among us isn't, these days?) is that piece becomes the centerpiece or signature piece for your room, and you'll pick up the dominant colors and tones in your soft furnishings, drapery, throw pillows and the like, as well as decorative accessories. This leaves you free to invest wisely in simple, well-made, understated furniture for the rest of the room in classic upholstery fabrics and natural wood, timeless forms and materials that will stand the test of time as you redecorate from time to time later on.

I love hand painted furniture for children, when it's done well and with imagination in the design, because the artists can really let loose their creativity on the relatively small pieces - and every face and plane of an assembled furniture piece, like a chair, can be used for a different color or pattern, so you get a different visual effect from the chair almost every time you walk into the room, because you're always seeing it at a slightly different angle. Ogle these beauties and give it some thought - do you have a beat-up old mini rocker or potty chair that couldl get a new life if hand painted?

We love the Fantasy Fields chairs as a decorative piece in the front foyer, where they can hold a guest's hat and handbag as well as bringing a welcome spot of color to an area that's often hard to decorate. If your foyer doesn't have quite enough width to accommodate a child's hand-painted wooden chair, however, do consider the practical beauty of a hand-painted bookcase from the same line. Decorate the nursery or toddler's bedroom now - then move these witty little pieces out into the mudroom, foyer, family room or sunroom for a touch of whimsy when your child eventually outgrows them or is ready to move on to a new bedroom theme.

You can do it - yes you can!

Take your inspiration from the elaborate details and faux effects of the tables, chairs, cabinets, etc. that are painted by experts, like those beauties I'm showing you on this page, and maybe choose one or two for an accent piece - but finish out the room with your own hand painted furniture if you're up for it. Not only a budget-wise move, but you'll feel such a sense of accomplishment when you look at your artistic creations!

I just stumbled across this neat little video and wanted to share it, to get you inspired. It's a quick run-through of a bunch of different DIY painted furniture projects - with the before and after pictures we love! - to give you an idea of how very "do-able" it is to give a boring or shabby piece of furniture a cool makeover with a bit of paint.

You may recognize Sheila McGraw as the illustrator for Robert Munsch's well-loved children's book, Love You Forever - but my introduction to her wonderful world of color and whimsy came with her other home-decor-craft "how to" books on soft toys, paper mache, decoupage, etc. I like McGraw's style, and I like the way she gives enough directions to equip one to carry out the projects her books inspire, but never locks in the imagination of her readers - her books are one part instruction and two parts inspiration.