Chair leg repair is tricky. Can you tell which leg was broken completely in half? Neither can I unless I get about an inch away.
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Tag: furniture repair
Cedar Chest Restoration
Here is the cedar chest restoration job we recently completed. We’re quite pleased with the results.
How we approached the Cedar Chest Restoration…
We started by stripping off all the old finish. This chest had been “loved” on for many years and what little of the original finish that was remaining was in rough shape – so we had no choice but to take it down to the bear wood. Since we’re a professional shop, we have an overflow system that allows stripper to be pumped through a fluid hose with a brush on the end. The piece sits in a shallow tub while we gently scrub and rinse it down with stripper. This “washing” off of the finish is very efficient and not harmful to the piece.
After we had all of the old finish stripped off we wiped it clean with lacquer thinner and left to dry for a day. Once dried there were a few areas of veneer that were damaged so we repaired these areas prior to staining. In this case we used one our own stain colors which is similar to the color Minwax’s English Chestnut. After staining with our own stain, we air brushed some black stain around some of the edges and crevices. This enhances the details and assist in bringing back some of the patina that was removed when stripping.
Notice in the picture below we saved the advertisement that was attached to the inside of the chest and reapplied once done with the restoration. Lane must have had a collaboration with an insurance company that offered insurance. How cool is that?? But given inflation you’d probably need a bit more than $100.00.
Finally we applied several coats of lacquer, rubbing out in between coats. The final result is a nice soft luster on a piece that will last another couple generations.
Refinished French Country Table Top
The Refinished French Country Table Top project
This table top had been in use for a couple generations and was completely worn out. Furthermore, because of the heavy use and accumulation of oils, grease, furniture polish and who knows what else, the finish had become soft and gooey.
Sooooo… As a starting point we had to sand the top all the way back to bare wood. In this case we didn’t chemically strip it because we were saving the original hand painted skirt. Yes it was all heavy sanding and elbow grease. After we sanded it back we wiped it down many times with lacquer thinner to ensure we’d gotten any remaining chemical residue off the wood. This remaining residue can wreck havoc on a new finish.
Building the brown base color was fairly straightforward and we sealed this in with a couple coats of lacquer. However the slightly blueish/gray haze that was originally on the table proved the most challenging aspect to reproduce. After experimenting with various methods we finally were able to tint our lacquer such that we achieved the desired affect. After getting the haze just right, we we then covered the entire surface with a few more coats of lacquer.
Beautiful, late 1800’s wardrobe restoration
Why we restored it…
Generally speaking you don’t want to modify or refinish a piece this age as it can have a very negative effect on the value. However, the client had already begun to strip the piece before contacting me so that made us all in! We had to refinish it for this wardrobe restoration.
What we did in this restoration..
The client had attempted to sand on one side and had sanded through the paint to what was a yellow/golden color. Initially, we thought they had sanded through to a layer of milk paint. However, after working on the piece a bit, we discovered this wasn’t a light coat of milk paint. Rather it was the color that the underneath poplar had aged to. I have never seen poplar turn this beautiful golden hue… I guess it was the mixture of painted top coats, age of the wood and the environment that made this happen. As such the color was chosen…we were going to leave it natural. Read more