Another whitewashed winner

So here's one more whitewash paint-over project: when I sanded the cabinet (from a previous post) to try my first whitewash experiment, I sanded a magazine rack as well.

I've always loved vintage wooden magazine racks; I see them a lot at flea markets and estate sales.  As someone who's always reading (and surrounded by piles of reading material - like books, magazines and catalogs), I need somewhere to put everything.

The only thing I usually don't like about the vintage wooden magazine racks?  The colors.

They must have been really popular in the 1970's, because I find lots of really dark stained ones.

I found and bought three over the last couple of years for this house, so far I have only refinished one.  And, as usual, I forgot to take a "before" photo of the one I sanded and painted.  But all three had nearly the same finish when I found them, so here's a pic of one of the ones I haven't refinished yet.  (I'll use it as the "before" pic I don't have):

This one has a sweet cut-out tulip design on the side. It'll be a nice little future afternoon project.
This is stained brown, it's not too bad looking, but not anything memorable either.

The other two magazine racks were painted brown.
 It baffles me why someone would ever paint something like this brown...to mimic stain, maybe?
It seems like the most boring color in the world...but I guess brown was a look in the '70's.

Anyway, here is the finished, whitewashed product:

It actually took a long time to sand and whitewash this.

That's why I've only done one of three so far.

It also took a lot of coats of whitewash to get it looking right, but I love how it came out.

It's definitely brighter!

I whitewashed this on my day of whitewash experimentation.  But it took so long, I'll probably just paint the other two.

I think I paid $4 or $5 for these - definitely worth it, I love having magazines or cookbooks around for when I have a few minutes to take a break and read.  Another one of those things people get rid of that always surprises me, since they're so handy for organization.  I'm guessing in the digital age people are just reading less the old school way...not a problem of mine!