Painting wood furniture: A DIY guide for the perfect finish

Close up of detailed wood furniture being painted teal with a paintbrush

Painting wooden furniture can give an item a new lease of life in your home (Image credit: Getty Images)

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Steps for painting wood furniture
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Need to refresh your favourite furniture? Painting wood furniture can turn old tatty items into fresh, smart, contemporary objects of desire. A new coat of paint can transform a rarely used sideboard into a focal point, a chair into a functional thing of beauty and give a bookshelf a new lease of life.

But you need to make sure that you are doing it right. Like most painting wood projects, preparation and paint are the key. Poor preparation and the wrong paint will soon see your newly painted furniture peel and chip and need a new coat of paint. Find out what you need to know to stop this happening.

Painting wood furniture

There’s a lot of different types of wood furniture out there, from natural wood like pine to manufactured woods like MDF, but how do you paint them? Or can you? Michael Rolland, Managing Director at The Paint Shed reveals there’s a paint for every wood, you've just got to choose the right one. “It’s less about avoiding certain types of wooden furniture and more about the compatibility between the wood and the paint you have. For example, have you made sure that your wood paint is fit for use on interiors? And do you have the correct primer for your paint?"

If the furniture you are looking to paint has handles, knobs, or any other type of hardware you need to remove this to make sure that you don’t get paint on them. Get a screwdriver/Allen key, remove and make sure to store the parts in a container so you don't lose them.

Now remove any drawers and put them to one side. Ideally you want to remove doors and shelves – if your furniture has any – as this makes them easier to paint and get a good consistent finish on.

When painting furniture you need to clear a space to work in and lay down dust sheets like this 3 Pack Extra Large Plastic Dust Sheets for Decorating from Amazon. Ideally you want to be working inside in an area where there’s little disturbance, so no-one knocks into the furniture when drying or kicks up dust that can stick to your paint. In the summer months you can work outside if you have the space.

When the primer is dry, apply thin coats of paint with a suitable brush or roller. If your furniture has detail, start by painting this first and then paint the larger, easier to paint areas. Leave the first coat to dry, rub down with a 240 grit sandpaper, wipe down and apply a second. Two coats should be enough, but if needed, add a third coat and leave to dry as recommended.

If using chalk or milk paint you can add a wax finish or even a varnish to help protect the paint and keep your furniture looking good for longer.

There is an argument that you don’t need to prime wood furniture if using a self priming paint, and your furniture is not going to get constant everyday use – like a bookshelf or sideboard. As long as your prep is done properly you won’t need a primer.

But, if painting bare wood on furniture that is going to get a lot of use – such as a chair – we recommend that you use a primer for bare wood. This also helps cover the wood so you can use less of the top coat.

There’s a lot of choice, depending what type of finish you are looking for and whether the paint you want is available in the colour you want. But whatever finish you want the paint still needs to be the right choice as Rolland reveals, “We’d always recommend a water-based, durable and hard-wearing quality paint for wooden furniture to ensure that the finished look is long-lasting. Farrow and Ball’s Dead Flat paint is ideal as it is both as it offers excellent coverage, is hard wearing and can be washed and wiped clean without damaging the colour or flat finish it creates. Apply the paint with a brush or roller and cover with a second coat after four hours of drying time for the most seamless finish.”

But there are other choices as Rolland continues, “A good trade paint alternative would be Tikkurila Helmi 30 Paint, which is a durable furniture paint that is also ideal for painting small items like window frames, doors, kitchen cabinets, radiators and more.”

Other paints Homebuilding & Renovating recommend would be the Frenchic indoor furniture paint range or if looking for a high gloss finish try this Dulux Trade High Gloss from Amazon.

This depends very much on what type of furniture you are looking to paint. But a brush is typically your first choice, especially if your furniture has detail and few flat surfaces. Use a set of brushes like this Harris SGOOD 5BRUSH Set from Amazon, so you have brushes for small details, larger details and flat surfaces. If you are using chalk paint try this Professional Chalk and Wax Paint Brush 2PC Set from Amazon.

Steve Jenkins is a freelance content creator with over two decades of experience working in digital and print and was previously the DIY content editor for Homebuilding & Renovating.

He is a keen DIYer with over 20 years of experience in transforming and renovating the many homes he has lived in. He specialises in painting and decorating, but has a wide range of skills gleaned from working in the building trade for around 10 years and spending time at night school learning how to plaster and plumb.

He has fitted kitchens, tiled bathrooms and kitchens, laid many floors, built partition walls, plastered walls, plumbed in bathrooms, worked on loft conversions and much more. And when he's not sure how to tackle a DIY project he has a wide network of friends – including plumbers, gas engineers, tilers, carpenters, painters and decorators, electricians and builders – in the trade to call upon.