What Paint for A Rescued Dresser

[Hotwheels]

Basic question is: Is there a one step paint I can use to paint over a lacquered veneer piece of furniture?

I rescued a well-made mahogany venner over poplar dresser with a lacquer finish. The veneer is missing in a couple of places and badly scratched in others.  I was going to build a similar cabinet/dresser to hold some fly tying supplies, but this dresser will work fine other than it is ugly.

I don't paint anything other than walls, so I watched a bunch of furniture flipper YouTube videos about furniture painting and other than milk or chalk paint, some folks just paint over an already finished surface using a variety of different paints. I know I can sand, prime and use a latex paint too, but I would prefer the fewest steps possible.

is there a one step paint product I can use?

Thanks,

 

[Packard]

I've used General Finishes "Milk" paint, which is really a modern acrylic paint rated for indoors and outdoor use.  I applied it according to their video with a foam brush.  Amazingly all the brush marks disappear and no runs.  The finish looks like a sprayed finish, albeit matte finish.

As a matte finish, it will scuff, so I top coated with a clear water based poly.  That works great using glossy clear, but satin clear made the black look like gray.  I suspect it would alter the shade of any dark color.

I spray cabinets with Benjamin Moore's Advance.  The whites and light colors dry slowly but cure hard and I would not hesitate to paint furniture with this paint.  But the dark colors and black dry slow and cure even more slowly and never get as hard as the light colors.  Though the stock black seems to get harder than the custom color black.  I would not feel comfortable using this on furniture.

I painted an exterior door with gloss black using rattle cans of gloss Rustoleum and that came out looking excellent.  It dried reasonably quickly and dried very hard.  I would not hesitate to use the rattle cans of Rustoleum for furniture.  But color selection is very limited.  It is cheap and easy to use though.

Fine Paints of Europe sells a very, very glossy enamel that has an excellent reputation for hardness.  But it also is supposed to have a particularly strong odor until it cures.  It needs ventilation.  Spraying can be hazardous as this is a flammable paint.  It requires special thinner.  I priced out doing a front door and the paint and thinner would have cost a little over $100.00 for one door (exterior only).  But the look is outstanding.  Plenty of videos online for FPE and the company has a good reputation too.  Very limited distribution but they supposedly ship quickly from the home office.

Also note that you may have to lay down a new piece of veneer to paint over.  Blending the old chipped veneer by sanding will show through and look terrible. Remove the offending veneer and lay down bit of birch veneer which will take paint beautifully.

 

[Hotwheels]

Thanks, useful suggestions.  There was a piece of veneer missing on the body of the piece and I filled that section with some wood filler, but I'll take your suggestion and get some birch veneer and strip off the remaining veneer and filler and apply the birch so that the look will be consistent.  I'm looking for a matte finish on the piece and I'm using the dresser as a learning experience for some basement cabinets I plan to build and paint a matte black.