Tiny Rocking Chair

Rocking Chair Before

Chairs are the most commonly restored and refinished items that we receive. Chairs come in many styles, sizes, shapes and are made of too many types of wood to list, but they have one thing in common; they are not easy to refinish due to the many surfaces they tend to have. This tiny rocking chair once belonged to a little girl who has since grown up and wanted to preserve the many memories she likely had while enjoying the time she spent in this rocking chair.

Rocking Chair After

She may have sat by a window and enjoyed a Nancy Drew mystery novel as she rocked in time to the suspenseful mystery unfolding before her. Perhaps she stacked her stuffed animals on this chair to "keep it company" while she was at school. No matter how she used this little gem, likely she enjoyed it as a child and now as an adult, would like to see her own children make their own memories. This was a generational rocking chair meant to be passed down. As it where, the rocking chair had a couple of broken spindles in the center of the back. In fact, the entire chair came apart upon closer inspection, so repairing and gluing the broken spindles in place was the first thing that had to be done.

We normally allow at least twenty-four hours for anything glued to dry thoroughly before continuing the refinishing process. The next day, the clamps were removed and after checking everything was nice and tight, I began the tedious process of stripping. This chair was made of walnut, a very hard wood commonly used for furniture. Walnut is great chair material since chairs tend to take a beating, especially if they are used by children. This particular chair was not one of my easiest stripping jobs. The finish simply refused to come off without a fight, so it required many applications of stripping gel followed by lacquer thinner to remove the ultra sticky residue from the chair's many surfaces.

The spindles are always the hardest part of any chair project because round objects can't be scraped with a putty knife in the traditional way as a flat surface can be. You must use the side of the putty knife and remove the old stain and varnish one strip at a time, until you have completed all sides of the spindles. This is  no easy task, especially when the spindles are close together as they were with this smaller version of a big rocking chair. It required a lot of time, patience and dedication as I was up to the task of seeing it become a lovely, restored treasure that will carry on for future generations to come.

Once I had removed all the stain and completed the tedious task of sanding, first with 150 grit then followed with 220 grit, this yielded a smooth surface which was ready for stain. I used a small tack cloth to remove the sawdust residue and chose Varathane dark walnut stain, a rich, soft dark brown stain which was perfect for this little rocking chair. The color was a little bit lighter than the original walnut stain, but over time the chair will become darker naturally to a rich, deep tone and develop a rich patina original to this particular chair.

After allowing the chair to dry for 24 hours, I applied two coats of semi-gloss polyurethane (allowing a day to dry between coats) and the chair was done. I love how the color worked with the new replacement spindles as they blended well with the original ones. It's important to take that into consideration when replacing broken elements on furniture. Use as close to the original as you can so it will look like it did when it was built.

This chair was quite time consuming, but as always, the end result makes all that hard work well worth the time spent to make it that way.