Your home’s main entry area is often the first impression guests have of your home. It’s also often a high-traffic area so it not only needs to look good and welcome to your guests, it also has to be easily organized and function well for your family. Our new-to-us, refinished hall table helps us achieve just that.
Our main entry hall isn’t often used for welcome guests but it is a very high traffic area of our home. It’s where we receive our mail and it’s the main artery that connects my studio, our upstairs and our main living area. It’s very prone to clutter and rarely looks picture perfect.
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One of the solutions I came up with to help combat clutter is removing the small bookshelf that has only served as a place for mail and junk to pile up. It was never meant to be a permanent fixture there anyway and was way too bulky for the space.
When my mother-in-law gave us a small console table she was getting rid of, I knew immediately it would be the perfect replacement for our entry.
I didn’t get photos of the before but it was very much my mother-in-law’s style (country / primitive) and not at all what we prefer but I knew I could refinish it to better fit our home.
I removed the wooden knobs and give the entire piece a good clean and then lightly sanded it. The original finish was paint so I only had to scuff up the finish.


Using black milk paint, I gave the entire table two coats. Once it was dry, I brushed the entire piece with black finishing wax.
I’ve used the Rust-Oleum milk paint for a few projects. It requires at least two coats usually, sometimes more which I don’t love yet it’s really easy to use, easy to find in-store and online and cleans up well. The thing that takes this from good to fantastic is actually the finishing wax.
This Jolie Finishing wax is really easy to apply and when it dries / hardens, the finish is really beautiful and durable. It’s kind of a matte satin; not too shiny but not dull like milk paint. I did my repurposed bedroom nightstand using this same exact process as well as our living room end tables. I even have one other project I’m wanting to tackle using the same black paint and wax.

I had a few of these knobs left over from another project and even though they are a little large for the piece, I loved that I didn’t have to spend any money.
This little console table is the perfect size to fit just inside our front door between it and my studio door. It’s just enough to add a little interest to the entry without taking up too much space or creating surfaces to collect clutter.
I haven’t done a lot of styling yet but this has been the answer we needed for now.
Sources:
Black and Gol Knobs: Here
Rust-oleum Milk Paint in Eclipse: Here
Black Finishing Wax: Here
Curtains and Basket: Target (old)
Wooden Pedestal and Vase: Hobby Lobby
Plaid Throw: Kirkland’s
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