Stripped

 (unfortunately, I didn't get a photo of the mirror)

When I saw this thing I knew exactly what needed to be done. My client wanted to consign it in my shop and just wanted me to paint over it. But I knew that underneath this was probably gorgeous oak.

I am all for painting furniture. Especially the gross, ugly veneered stuff one finds at Goodwill or on the side of the road, or at the recycling center with the garbage, as I have done on a couple of occasions.

However, what I am not all for is painting furniture in this manner. I apologized to this piece several times in the process of ridding it of it's Smurf blue high gloss coating.


SO I pulled out the ol gel stripper and the elbow length rubber gloves and slathered the snotty stuff on and three layers of paint later, it started to show it's inner beauty...

then came several hours of sanding with various grits of paper on my two different sanders, a thorough cleaning with denatured alcohol, a coating of Minwax wood conditioner, another sanding and cleaning with more denatured alcohol, and finally two coats of "honey" by Minwax, which I love.  

The mirror was a beast; I pried off the carved appliques and that was a life saver. I was able to use tiny tools and brushes to get in all the nooks and crannies. Then they popped right back into place. I also had to add new knobs, as the ones it came with were white plastic, and the original wood ones were long gone. I chose these antique repro ones from Hobby Lobby.

I finished the piece with Howard's Feed n' Wax, which is a product I just RAVE about. I love all the Howard products for wood.

I did not, and will not put any Polyurethane products on this piece or any antique piece. I have really come to despise polyurethane and even polyacrylic, for a lot of reasons. I think this looks just fine with it's beeswax based finish.

This lovely is available in my shop for $275.00, delivery available to certain areas of VA  and NC.