Hooked on spraypaint.

A few days ago, I came across this sweet little Anthropologie hook on Pinterest and I immediately pinned it:

Source

So adorbs! The Trolley Stop hook retails for $12 a pop. Kinda overpriced for a hook if you ask me, but that’s how Anthro rolls. It totally reminded me of the vintage door hardware we cleaned up for our bathroom door:

It also reminded me of this hideous brass hook we found and saved:

That shiny gold sucker was hanging on the back of the master bedroom door we removed and sealed up. You can almost see it in this way-back-when-we-demolished-the-master-bedroom picture I dug up:

The brass hook isn’t really vintage at all; it says TAIWAN on the back. We’re guessing by the cheesy shiny brass finish that it’s from the ’80s. Bradley voted on tossing it, but for whatever reason — maybe because I’m from the ’80s, too? — I couldn’t toss it in the trash. I tucked it away in a moving box instead and forgot all about it. Until I saw the hook’s better looking sister on Pinterest, that is.

We dug up the hook and took it out to the yard for a little spray paint action. We went with the same flat black that we’re using on all of our vintage hardware. A little tie-everything-together trick that we think will help make it look older than it actually is.

Here’s how the hook looked after 2 coats and an overnight dry:

Equally adorable, and way cheaper. This quickie makeover cost us, maybe, 2 cents worth of spray paint and 5 minutes worth of time. Sorry, Anthro. We win this round.

In case you’re wondering what that beat-up surface behind the hook is, it’s the back of our bathroom door:

Bradley stripped all of the latex paint off, and then sanded it to a smooth finish. We were planning on painting it a crisp white, but we’re pretty smitten with the raw look. You can see 4 different layers of history:

There’s the white paint on top. Then the older cream paint. And a dark greyish stain peeks out from behind that. And finally there’s the raw wood.

The more we looked at it, the more we liked it. But it would also look pretty slick painted white. Then again, the hook and hardware looked really cool against the distressed surface:

We couldn’t decide, so we left it raw for now. We know the remaining paint is lead-based, so if we don’t paint it white, we’ll seal it with a clear coat. We cleaned it up to the point that there’s zero flaking and chipping, but we like to play it safe.

More pictures of the door are coming up in another post where we show you the painted hall. Hint: it looks hot. Stay tuned!

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