How to Paint Wrought Iron Furniture the Easy Way!

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Learn how to paint wrought iron furniture, the easy way! Get easy tips for updating old patio furniture.

I bought a wrought iron furniture set over the winter for a steal. It was in horrible shape, but I knew that with a little bit of work, it could be gorgeous.

What I didn’t realize is that I would fall in love with it and end up keeping it for myself instead of selling it! The struggle is real.

Once the weather warmed up a bit, I painted this patio set the easy way! Learn how to paint wrought iron furniture without picking up a single paintbrush.

How to Paint Wrought Iron Patio Furniture

Before

The wrought iron patio table was lovely but needed a paint job. The paint was a bit scratched up, and there were rust spots. I know a lot of people love the shabby look, but this set was looking shabby in a bad way. 

The chairs were in worse shape. Don’t worry; those seats were thrown away! 

After

Supplies Needed 

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• Home Right Super Finish Max Sprayer
• Rust reformer spray paint
• Outdoor paint (I used Sherwin Williams Tricorn Black)
• Stripper brush
• Plastic drop cloths

I don’t have process pictures, but I can share some tips.

Remove Rust and Loose Paint Chips from Wrought Iron Furniture

Remove any loose paint chips with a stripper brush. Clean the furniture thoroughly.

Then, seal all the rust spots with Rust Reformer spray paint. This seals the rust so that it doesn’t bleed through your pretty new paint.

Should You Spray or Brush Wrought Iron Furniture?

I sprayed the table using my Home Right Super Finish Max sprayer. For a more detailed post on how to use the sprayer, click here.

Basically, water down the paint and spray. Then, make sure to clean the sprayer thoroughly. It’s easier than you think, though!! And the coverage is great when you use a sprayer! 

My wrought iron furniture set had a lot of intricate details, so spraying the set made it easy to cover all of those curls and curves in minutes. Seriously, this set was painted in less than 30 minutes.

Painting with a brush is possible, but it will take a lot longer and require more coats of paint.

You could also use spray paint, but it will require several cans.

Using a paint sprayer allows you to use your favorite color of paint. I used Sherwin-Williams Tricorn Black because I was playing it safe to sell this set. But a bright turquoise would have been fun as well.

Eventually, I might repaint it a fun color (spraying makes it easy enough to do that) and replace the glass top with wood planks.

Since I used latex paint, the wrought iron furniture needed extra time to cure. Just try to avoid scratching it for about a month, and you’re good.

Latex paint takes about 30 days to cure, but even spray paint will scratch if it hasn’t had enough time to cure. It it gets a little scratch, touching up the paint with a small paint brush only takes a few seconds.

Since the seats were disgusting, I used them to trace templates for new plywood seat bases that I cut with a jigsaw. Then I used foam and outdoor fabric to make new seat cushions.

This wrought iron patio table set was available for sale for about a month, before I realized how much I loved it. (The legs were still muddy from being at Lucketts spring market. It has rained so much now that the mud is gone and it looks beautiful again!)

Curious to see more patio pictures? 

It fits perfectly on the small patio in our front yard. Vintage furniture comes in the nicest sizes! Who can blame me for keeping this piece?

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