Expert: Eileen Cronk - 12/18/2006

Question
Can you tell me what to do with a dresser that looks like a wood base, but has a laminate cover over the drawers, top, and sides.  It has some bad scrates.  A child took a knife or sharp object and carved names into the drawers.  Also where the knobs/pulls go there is a lot of deep scratches.  Can I sand off this area and restain, sand out the scratches and blend the color, or paint it, anything?  I just don't know where to start.  Thanks so much for your help.

Answer
Hi Cindy
Nice to hear from you.
Yes you can fill all the scratches and gouges with filler then sand smooth.
Cindy when you say "laminate" do you mean plastic or wood veneer?
If its plastic, then paint.
If its wood veneer and you feel you can disguise the damage enough, then I would strip the entire piece and refinish it.
Wood veneer can be quite nice if its in fairly good shape.
In this case if you are refinishing, do the stripping before you use the filler.
Cindy I hope I have answered all you want to know, but if not, please get back to me.
This sounds like a great project, and even if you have never done this type of thing before, just jump in and get started.
And if you need help with the refinishing part let me know.
Kindest Regards
Eileen

And in this case I think it would be best to paint the entire dresser