Here is what our second upstairs bathroom looked like when we bought our townhouse. It was truly scary! The floors were gross! The vanity cabinet was dark and dreary. It needed some TLC for sure! 
Here is what it looks like now. 
First we replaced the flooring with the same dark wood floor we have throughout the entire house. I like houses with flooring that never changes. I think it creates a great flow from room to room and it makes the house feel larger. I painted the walls Oasis Blue by Benjamin Moore and the ceiling in a fun yellow and white stripe (sorry don’t remember the color). I primed the vanity with BIN primer. BIN primer is a shellac base primer that will just about stick to any surface. I have painted a lot of pre-finished furniture and cabinets with this stuff. It works really well and leaves a smooth finish. I used two coats of primer on the cabinets because the primer is very thin by design. I think this allows it to stick better and go on smoother. Oh yeah, and this primer dries very quickly, so it makes the project go pretty fast. I used a sponge roller when painting both the primer coat and the finish coat. I always use sponge rollers when painting furniture and cabinetry. It creates a smooth finish and the rounded edge of the roller makes painting nooks and crannies much easier.
Click these pictures to check out each product from Home Depot.
Then I painted the vanity cabinet gloss white. I used a 100% acrylic gloss paint for this. You can use acrylic or oil based paint over the BIN primer. It only took one top coat because the primer had already done most of the work covering the wood finish.
For a finishing touch on the vanity I replaced the hardware with pulls from an Ikea chest I already had. I had previously replaced the hardware on the Ikea chest with cute knobs I found on clearance at Anthropologie.
The last step of the makeover was to add some fun and colorful decor. I chose a cute Cow picture (also from Ikea), a colorful shower curtain (from Target) and bath mat (also Target) and done. It doesn’t look too shabby now and it is a fresh space that is airy, inviting, and fun for Luke!
