Project Restyle: Gold-Marbled Entryway Table

Sometimes I think the entryway area of a house gets the short end of the decor stick (so to speak). This seems to be especially true if you don’t have a very large entryway.

We have a short hallway that brings people into our house, and I was never really sure if I had enough room to do anything with the area, but I decided to give it a shot and see what I could do with the bit of space we have.

I’d seen those really skinny console tables around and I thought one of those would be good for the space and give us a place to drop off our keys and what not by the door.

I found a console table at a local store for a good price, but it was lacking the personality that I wanted for the only piece of furniture that can fit in that space, so I thought a makeover was definitely in order!

OK, before someone in the audience yells out, “I liked the table better before!” let me say that this wasn’t a bad table to begin with. I mean, I’m really not a big fan of glass topped furniture personally, but gold legs can definitely be cool.

However, the gold finish on this table was actually a weathered antiqued gold (it’s hard to see in the photo above), so even if I kept the legs that color, I would have wanted to repaint them a solid gold anyway.

I had just bought a big brass mirror for the entryway at a local flea market and I really wanted the gold color of the mirror to be the star of the space. So, instead of gold, I thought a white table base would better suit the space. One can of semi-gloss spray paint later and the base of the table was done.

The top of the table was a bit trickier to decide on than the legs. I cut a 3/4″ thick board to be just bigger than the current top of the table, and I wanted to do a faux Carrara marbling technique on the board.

I say “wanted to” because it didn’t quite work out that way…I tried a couple of times to get the technique down (using this tutorial), but my brush wasn’t quite right for the job, my paint was drying too fast, and I just couldn’t get the hang of it.

I’m still resolved to figure out that technique and I’m going to keep trying until I get it, but I thought I should think of a different solution for the table in the meantime so I didn’t have a half-finished piece of furniture in my entryway for the next few months.

I still liked the idea of marbling, so I bought gold marbled paper to use for the table top instead.

I cut the marbled paper to be just slightly bigger than the top of my board and used a satin finish decoupage to adhere it to the wood board. Once it was totally dry, I did two more coats of finish on top to make sure the top was adequately sealed.

I have to say though, every time I decoupage paper and put on a top coat of finish, I freak out when the wet paper bubbles until they eventually calm down and flatten out as it dries. I also cut a few pieces of wood trim and painted them white to be a frame around the board to give it more of a finished look.

Once the paint was dry, I used small finishing nails to attach the trim around the edges and painted over the nail holes. I attached the new table top to the base with a strong epoxy glue and my new entryway table was ready for action!

I am seriously over the moon with how this table came out. I love it! The white looks fresh and clean and the pop of the gold marbling perfectly compliments the brass mirror above.

It’s also great to finally have a spot next to the door to set keys, sunnies, and mail so that doesn’t all pile up on the kitchen counter instead. I would say that this makeover was a success indeed! xo. Laura

Credits // Author: Laura Gummerman, Photography: Laura Gummerman + Todd Gummerman.