Clock Table from a Flea Market Find

By Joan
March 30, 2015
91 Comments

Last August I went with my sisters and my youngest son, Nathan, and we attempted to conquer the Route 11 Yard Crawl. We made it through about 25 miles of the 40 mile yard sale before it was quitting time. It was during that trip that Nathan bought a dartboard for $1 and the bottom of this table for $5. His first thought was to attach the dartboard to the table and make a really cool and unique table. Well, time passed, and he eventually decided to use the dartboard as a dartboard, and in October, he made a really cool dart board cabinet out of scrap wood and corrugated tin.

Well, the dartboard cabinet turned out great but the table has been sitting in my workshop ever since just calling out to me. “Joan, you know you want to give me a makeover.” You know, I really did! But it wasn’t until I saw this table round in Home Depot for $6.88, that I formed a plan. I bought the table round and got the go ahead from Nathan. For some reason he was all for me doing the work. Before I began with the finish to my table I sanded down the round top purchased from Home Depot. I wanted a little layered aged look to my (Nathan’s) table so the first thing I had to do was start layering. First, a coat of American Walnut stain to just the table top. the bottom, was already stained a nice dark color. Layer two was a coat of gray to the entire table. Finished off with a coat of white. Once dry the entire table was sanded down. I was able to find a clock face I liked here. Strangely enough, that website is a Halloween discussion forum. Like my vintage sign from last week, I used the same low-tech transfer technique. 1) Open the clock picture in Publisher and enlarge to the desired size , in this case 23 inches. 2) Print out the clock picture on 9 sheets of paper, cut off the edges and tape the picture back together. Color in the back with pencil the parts of the clock to be transferred. 3)Tape the clock picture to the wood table top and with a pen (and ruler) trace over all the lines you want transferred. The pencil works like carbon paper to transfer the numbers. 4) Paint in the lines.

Once the paint was dry, I once again sanded the table top as well as the edges on the rest of the table. This is where I began to see some of my paint layers shining through. Finished off with a coat of wax tinted with a medium stain.

I could have been done at this point but I wanted a bit more of a finished edge. These wooden hoops that were found at the same yard sale as the table, did the trick. I don’t know if you remember, but I used 3 of them for my orb chandelier. I pried them apart and with a finishing nailer attached them to the side of the table top. The hoop edge was then finished off with a dark stain and polyurethane.

I think the table turned out really well and I just might have to get Nathan to shop for all my furniture makeovers. I don’t think I would have given that table a second look even with a $5 price tag.

Like clocks? I have one more huge wall clock for your DIY inspiration. It started with the top of a wire spool.