Anyone who knows me knows I’ve been searching high and low for the perfect (and affordable) bar cart for our apartment for about a year now.  Finding a nice mix of the two is virtually impossible and I had come to terms with the idea of splurging.

It’s not that I’m a cocktail connoisseur, there’s just something so classic and chic about bar carts.  They seems old fashioned yet can be transformed to feel modern with the right styling.

That being said, I struck gold at Salvation Army the other week.  At first, I wasn’t sure if this piece could hold up to my standards.  However, for only $35 I decided to try it anyway. I KNOW!!! $35!! The only other one I’ve loved was $175.

I was so pleased to see that Pinterest was one step ahead of me and provided me with some awesome inspiration:

Check out the DIY below!

The cart came with a plane of glass for the top surface.  We removed it in order to glue some broken pieces back into place.  Wood glue works perfectly.

I decided to prime the cart before painting it since it had a polyurethane coat on it already.

I opted out of using spray paint for the final coat so that I could keep the project inside.  HERE is what I used.

To finish it off, I used one of my most favorite touches: marble contact paper.  I am obsessed with marble contact paper.  It is affordable, easy to use and remove, and instantly transforms any piece. I used it on my dresser a while ago.

Now came the fun part, styling.  Granted I didn’t have cute vintage bar accessories laying around so we had to improvise.  I had found some adorable Culver Glasses at Chicago Vintage Garage that weekend (similar here).  Paired with an awesome vintage tin tray I got a while back, everything started to come together.  I’ll post styling updates as I continue to collect!  Show me your own bar cart DIY’s in the comments!