Please ignore my poor English.

I don't mind the colour but I would wait until you have the dining table before you change the colour. Then decide

The wood color will look different depending on wall color, carpet/floor color and lighting. I agree to wait until you have the dining table and you can see how everything looks together.

Wendi,
This is a beautiful hardwood buffet, it would be a sin to paint it but if you dislike the colour at present, then you would need to rub the buffet back and chose a new stain BUT don't touch it until you have your dining table, as you would definitely want to matched it.
I am currently building and have purchased almost all my furniture on ebay, a great saving, including a hardwood coffee table and it is also a golden colour and I too don't like it and thought of staining but I'm going to wait till I have my lounge suite and see what I think when it's all closer to coming together and I have my carpet square.

I agree, the piece of furniture is beautiful just as it is. However, the product I recommended has an effect more like a stain than a paint even though it can be applied on top without rubbing the old stain back.

Thanks everyone! I will wait until we get our dinning table then( I do dislike the silver knots though, haha)

@wenli,
I can see that you would have to replace the knobs on the buffet purely because there are a few mismatched already but once you get your dining table and decide what your artwork and or ornaments are going to be, then you can decide on whether you have brass or glass knobs or other.
Keep us Houzzers informed on the dining table, and your ultimate choice, I'm sure we would all be interested in how you finish the room.
Cheers,
Barbara

This is avery beautiful piece of furniture, please don't paint it. Try giving it a good clean and polish with beeswax, it will bring it's beauty back out for you. I would also change the handles :)

I have started replace the silver knobs with the black one( two of them), then I stopped because I couldn't be sure whether to stain or paint ( the new knobs are quite pricy). Thanks for all your advice, I will keep you update how this end. :-)

@Wenli,
To tell you the truth, it's the silver handles that would be fashionable now but as you intimated, waiting until you make up your mind and buy your dining table is a good idea.

Agree wiuth Barbara and anyone thinking iof putting a paint-loaded brush or roller anywhere near a vintage timber piece of furniture..."it would be a... SIN! Seems the compulsion of the mass renovcators is to paint everything....and its the easiest solution. Don't think happy renovators and DIY-ers have changed much over the years either. I have just finished stripping five coats of enamel from the most beautiful set of silky oak french doors with etched frosted glass...how many SINS there!!! Silky oak is an open grain timber so the last coats had to be done by the funny little man out in his bush shack restoration shed...and Oh what a beautiful job! I am over the moon and do not care what it cost...although it was not a lot compared to what I'd have paid in Sydney.
Here a tip for any appreciators...(.if there are any left) of fine timbers. All you need is an old enamel bath tub and gallons of metholated spirits....just give it a bath and save yourself hours of scraping and fumes and burns.
SORRY about the deviatiuon but this is my latest Soap Box...don't paint vintage timber!
About your problem Wendi, I think, with Barbara, wait until you have your whole dining set and then stain the piece to fit in with the timber in that...( unless you are going to get a white one...( tongue in cheek).
I've seen some really nice dining sets with the best of both ...legs and table frame in a (cringe) painted colour and table top in timber...saw a really desirable inlaid table top at my favourite little man's shed last week..the rest was painted and had a drawer for each place....with old metal handles. Legs were on castors.. The chair seats were upholstered...but needed recovering and the frames were metal...could have been an alloy of sorts.
The combination of unpainted- stained timber..especially in inlay, with the painted parts, the metal frames and upholstered chairs just fitted together perfectly...so best of both.
You migh be lucky enough to find the perfect table with a natural timber top...( and I wish you to find one with an inlaid design featurting timbers of different hues....) then your lovely little cabinet/sideboard might fit perfectly!

There are some lovely timber stains around today...timber can be stained any colour...as long as its a transparent dye. A wonderful product is FEZLAC...that's the base and it is a shellac. To this you add the stain -colour you want. I've used it to put designs (fake inlay) on the backs of some really lovely old chairs...imitating the different natural timber hues in real inlay....So above are a few words, tales and suggestions that I hope will inspire you NOT to paint that cabinet.

Sorry I wholeheartedly disagree with the comments of not to paint. Paint it baby!! Paint it!!
If you are new to painting furniture I would recommend chalk paint as it is pretty much foolproof to apply and finish. I make my own and it works out sooo much cheaper than ready made. You can either wax the cabinet or lacquer (depending on the usage it will be subjected to, if heavy use lacquer) you can distress it easily for a rustic finish or high gloss modern finish. eBay has awesome handles, I bought a pack of 10 crystal knobs for about $11.60 delivered! The beauty of the chalk paint is that you won't even have to sand this piece therefore the original is laying in wait if years down the track you want to restore it. This is the last project I did, I usually do a modern finish but chose to distress this due to its age.

Hello Rachael, Easy to see that this cabinet was once a dressing table ...probably circa 1930's I think and probably dark stained or shellacked ply. If that were it I would have restored it and presented it as a feature for its own generation. Often these pieces make good little desks, sewing tables and display cabinets.. I still have a baby's wardrobe from the same era ...somebody painted it pink but under that there's a lovely solid pine piece with four dove tailed drawers down one side. a little hanging space with a solid timber door and a drawer across the bottom elevated by decorative feet. WAIT you beautiful little cabinet, you are about to see the world though your lovely natural solid timber eyes...and I just bet there will be a few people wanting to buy you.... but you are all MINE... and to think you only cost me $24!.

Rachel,
I think we must always go with what suits our personal needs, as I've mentioned in a earlier post and in the case of the unit you have, I had one the same and it went straight on the fire heap, as I never liked the style, and especially the shelaced ply full stop, so I admire what you have done instead.
I do not and never have liked any ply furniture but you have given your unit a new lease of life for sure.
I also detest pine, be it Baltic or otherwise and have made a consious decision to never have any of it or any other fake material like MDF etc... as much as practicable, save perhaps a few things like the kitchen cabinets and vanity unit.
I love what I call real timber, mahogony, hardwood etc...but still have no aversion to someone either painting or renovating a solid piece of furniture.
Again as I said, each to their own, if you like what you've done, it will create a bond between you and the item and it's fate is somewhat assured, unlike my units fate ha-ha

@Ladyrob1,
Robin,
I do so admire your passion and dedication to maintaining and renovating furniture to it's natural state over painting.
With your absolute aversion to such atrocity, I'm surprised, as your passion for paints and colours would have made me fairly sure that you would occasionally paint a item of furniture especially ply for example, like your baby wardrobe.
Goes to show I still have allot to find out about you or perhaps now I know everything ha-ha

Hi and thanks Brabara, I love anything pre 1940's, it may not be flash or solid but its genuine, good looking and practical and has a definite place ...in the history of Australian furniture. No I would never paint an item of furnitur made of timber. PLY, as much as it sits on the bottom rung of my timber preferences ( like subway tiles UGH, DOUBLE, TRIPLE UGH) it is a timber that reflects a time when people had no other option....and there's a resurgence of PLY ..."beautiful Ply" they are calling it... hate the idea...However, a poor man's little shellacked and dark stained bedside table...( maybe inclusive of night pot)... with rough timber insides...( not the pot), has a certain attraction for me and I like to see what it is in itself..Some of those pieces are quite sought after today, so if you are burning any please let me know!
My little junk restorer man out in the bush has heaps of stuff I'd love to bring home and love back to life!
My baby wardrobe is solid...PINE....Baltic PineI was told....can't wait to see who it really is but its definitely not Chinese or Mexican junk. Underneath there's a stamp..."European Labour Only". Whilst I do not like that connotation I know its a good little hand made piece. Its like digging for treasure...I get so excited scraping away, my instincts are usually right.
Last wek I bought a Commode chair at Vinnies...it was made of bits of this chair and that chair...some with carving, all dowelled together and shellacked...BADLY! But worth the time I am intending to put into it. NO..not even occasionally would I camoflage a piece of timber and pretend it is something else...and I know all the pattina tricks...how to make wood look like marble or leather. There's nothing fake about me and I think you know that now.

Itll be a lot of work to rub that whole cabinet back for a new stain. to achieve a true stain colour the timber must be rubbed back to raw especially if you wanna match a new dinning table which will be much harder than you think. I custom make my furniture mainly from left over materials from my construction jobs and what I have come to realise is that high gloss stain and enamel paints are much harder to get perfect then the majority of people think. (id put money on it that pro painters and furniture makers would agree)
Obviously you don't want to see any of the existing colour but even with electric sanders this can be very time consuming as the stain has soaked so deep into the timber.
my advice is not to try and match a new dinning table but to contrast it with a stain from the same scheme and maybe adding for example if you got a jarrah dinning table, then add a nice jarrah photo frame or display piece on the cabinet.

hannelorebiewald, did you have to strip the surface before you painted? I have some pine bookbases I would like to tone down.

I think wait till its in its new spot and see how it looks. I have timber furniture of different stains and actually they don't look too bad. I thought it could look strange at first, but the warm timber can make a house feel more homey. Just pick some new knobs for the drawers so they all match. They are very cheap on ebay.

Just one word - Paint!