Suitcase Makeover

I recently picked up an old, ugly but functional suitcase at a neighbor's garage sale for 50 cents. I came home, cleaned it up, put the kids' off season clothes in it, and stuffed it under the bed.

The neighbor is apparently an Ebay seller that people regularly unload their junk on. She's carried over two more big 'ol ugly suitcases to me in the last couple of weeks. They do work nicely for storage. Also the price is certainly right.

Old suitcase, before painting.

I figured there must be a way to pretty them up.

I did a little googling, and ran across this awesome before and after on Instructables.

I had my husband pick up some pretty spray paint on one of his many trips to Home Depot, and got to work. I tried taping off the silver trim on the first suitcase. It was a fussy job, and in the end, it turned out sort of sloppy. (I'm going to pick up another can of that color paint, and paint the trim after all.)

For the second suitcase, I skipped the taping, and painted the whole thing. It looked much better, and took considerably less time.

Old suitcase, after painting.

It looks great. I'm going to be scavenging Goodwill from now on for more. We don't have a lot of "hidden storage," (closets and cabinets,) in our house, and these are functional and cute "visible," storage. This blue one has replaced an ugly plastic tote full of yarn in my bedroom.