Painting an Antique Bed?

You shoudn't paint the Leather area. The leather area needs to be dyed (with leather dye) or basically, treated like a pair of shoes & polished with a quality shoe polish to change the color. You may need 2 coats. It's very easy to go darker, but much harder to go lighter in color. First clean it with a leather cleaner or a cleaner made to clean car interiors. Just follow the directions on the container of shoe polish & lastly buff the leather to a slight sheen with a soft cloth. The main thing you do not want to do is ruin the leather by using something on it that will eventually cause cracking & dry it out... "Armor-All" used to do this in the old days (cause cracking of leather) but I think they've fixed the problem & changed their formula. If your leather is super dry you can use "Frizz Ease" or Citre Shine's hair defrizzer (you only need a few drops, then buff it in).

Make sure the formula is made mostly with Dimethicone (It's like silicone & soaks into the leather to restore the moisture).

To paint the rest of the bed. Clean it well then wipe the painted area down with rubbing alcohol (to remove any lingering oils or residue) There's so many ways & techniques to change the color. One way would be to use a spray can primer & spray paint.

But there are countless ways to do this. It all depends on the condition of the bed right now (like is the paint peeling?) & what you want the finished project to look like. Send me a quick note to my mailbox here on ThriftyFun & I'll give you exact details & directions.