Before: French Provincial Hutch

I have had request upon request for another black hutch. I have a love/hate relationship with hutches. I love how they turn out; because they are such large pieces, their transformations are really quite striking and dramatic. On the flip side, though, they take a long time to do from start to finish; on average, a hutch takes me eight-twelve hours to complete from start to finish. I always feel like I have to gear up and get mentally prepared before I do a hutch. I've been trying to talk myself into working on this one for the past month:

I think I'm ready. The plan is to do all the prep work Monday, paint on Tuesday, distress and finish Wednesday. However, my sons seem to disagree with my plans often, so we'll see if things go according to plan. At the very latest, I'm hoping to have it done by next Friday or Saturday. The plan is a semi-gloss black with light distressing. I really like the hardware, and think it adds a lot to it, so I'm thinking I'm going to keep it and just paint it. The only thing I'm not sure about is the back portion of the top piece. I'm thinking I might take out the mirrored portion and put in wainscoting instead. Any requests?