As daft as it sounds, I'd recently brought a new vase that would look perfect in one corner of my living room, but I needed to buy a table to stand the new vase on! I've got some gold and glass side tables in the room which I love, but they are all being used for other purposes (climbing frames and rubbish disposal points mainly, but lets leave that gripe there..)  I needed a table that matched the existing side tables, but looking at brass side tables online I wasn't prepared to part with £60+ to display a £12.50 fake cactus vase.

Sometimes when you need an inexpensive bit of basic furniture there is only one thing for it - Ikea. I searched Ikea's website for a glass topped table and came across the VITTSJO laptop table. This table was perfect as aswell as having a glass top, it has a metal frame which is best for spray painting (and it was only 20 quid!)

I'm obsessed with gold and marble together, I think it is just a winning combination. I decided to hack this VITTSJO table with gold spray paint and marble-effect contact paper, which would look so much more desirable than the basic black & glass table it comes as.

The first task was to build the VITTSJO, minus the glass top. Honest to God this was definitely the easiest piece of Ikea furniture I've ever assembled. The instructions didn't even fill up one side of A4! You basically just stick in a few screws.

Once built, take the frame outside and spray paint it. I used PlastiKote in gold 'brilliant metallic', which I consider to be the best spray paint brand out there. Stand the table upside down first and do 2-3 thin, light coats, around 30 minutes apart. Keep shaking the can throughout (shake for a few seconds, then spray for a few seconds and repeat) as this will give you the best overall colour coverage. Turn the table the right way up for the final coat.

Between applying coats of paint, I got out the left over d-c-Fix marble-effect contact paper I had left over from upcycling my drinks trolley, took the glass top from the Ikea table and drew around it twice:

I then took a piece of card (you can use the cardboard the table came from Ikea in) and cut out the glass shape also, so I had 2 pieces of contact paper and a piece of card the same size as the glass table top.

I unpeeled and stuck the contact paper either side of the card so it was sturdy, then placed the contact paper sheet on the table and placed the glass over the top, and this is the result!

I took photos of the table in my husbands office as it was really sunny and you could see how good the spray paint looks - so ignore the background styling in these shots!

As the VITTSJO table is a laptop table you could transform two of these and they would make good, cheap bedside tables for early morning tea.

What's your best Ikea-hack? Tell me in the comments section below!