Cork woman gives old furniture new beginning

Tucked away in Midleton Community Centre, there is a room filled with antique and pre-loved furniture.

Some items are awaiting repair, a fresh coat of wax, or new upholstery, while other pieces are in for a full makeover, to be sanded, primed and painted a new colour.

This is the workshop of Debbie Walsh, owner of An Ré Nua Painted Furniture, which translates as ‘a new beginning’.

Debbie started her business in 2017, when it was originally called The Vintage Chalk Hut. After taking a few years off her full time job while her four daughters where young, she decided to change direction.

“I always had an interest in home furnishings and interiors,” says Debbie. 

I was constantly changing rooms around, moving furniture, painting walls.

Initially, Debbie worked out of her garden shed, and mainly for family and friends. Demand soon grew and she moved into a bigger workspace, which she still uses today.

At the beginning, she primarily focused on upcycling furniture using chalk paint. Over the years this evolved away from the ‘shabby chic’ finish of chalk paint to a more hard-wearing egg-shell finish.

As well as painting, Debbie does colour consultations, sources furniture, and repairs and restores pieces for clients.

Nearly all of her clients come through word of mouth.

“The only advertising that I do would be social media, Facebook and Instagram,” says Debbie.

She gets a lot of recommendations through local parents’ groups.

“These groups are really, really important,” she says.

“You know mums will be brutally honest, so if you get a recommendation from there, you know you’re okay.”

Debbie urges people to look after the furniture they already have rather than sending it to landfill. She says modern furniture may not be built as well as older pieces, and with a little bit of TLC, dated items can take on a whole new lease of life.

“It’s so important that we’re not dumping everything in landfill, that we respect what’s gone before,” she says. 

The beautiful craftsmanship and the finishes on some of these pieces are magnificent.

Debbie buys a lot of her paint locally in Pat McDonnell Paints in Midleton, and where possible she likes to use Irish brands. She says there is an advantage to choosing these.

“Those colours tend to work with our homes and with the light that we have in this country,” she explains.

“The light is different everywhere, and those colours work with the way the the sun goes around your house.”

Not every piece needs to be painted, and sometimes Debbie will restore the natural wood and simply check the piece is functional and has no marks or dents.

“I might not necessarily do anything with the piece, maybe only clean it and wax it,” she says.

I think that’s the trick with looking at old pieces, just because I paint furniture doesn’t mean that I believe all furniture should be painted.

Not one to follow trends, Debbie urges her clients to choose styles and colours that work for them and their home.

“The most important thing to me is that my home is welcoming, that the kids can relax, that it doesn’t matter if you spill something on furniture or floor,” says Debbie. “It needs to be a home at the end of the day.”

“Generally, I say to people, don’t follow trends, otherwise you’ll never be able to relax, because you’ll be constantly updating and looking for the next thing. What I would say to my clients is choose timeless, classic pieces with excellent workmanship.”

Clients regularly ask Debbie to source items for them, and spends a lot of time at auctions and house clearances.

“I go and source furniture for people, which is really interesting,” she says.

She advises anyone going to auctions themselves to do their research, get some advice, and be clear about what they want, as it’s easy to get caught up in ‘the thrill’ of an auction.

"If it’s your first one or two, and you see something and it’s cheap, you can get carried away,” she says.

Debbie also teaches furniture painting workshops every six to eight weeks. These three- hour sessions give people a chance to update a piece of furniture from their own home, with guidance from Debbie.

She helps them choose a colour based on the style they want, and the lighting and colour scheme of their home. She has had everyone from couples, to hen parties, to groups of foreign exchange students at the workshops.

Somebody might only paint something that night, and they might never again do anything, and then somebody else who will go home and look all over their house and say, I want to do that, that, and that.

Debbie is currently completing a course in biophilic design, which focuses on bringing the outside into the home.

“It’s all about bringing the outside in, and the importance of greens and browns and different colours, and using those in our homes,” says Debbie. “And having plants and greenery and foliage in our homes that have a purpose, such as cleaning the air.”

Debbie can be found on Instagram and Facebook as An Ré Nua Painted Furniture.