Two-Drawer Dresser Makeover

 

Two Drawer Dresser
Before

This cute little two drawer dresser was original much lighter and our customer had wanted a completely different look, so she chose two stain colors, black stain on the body and a warmer wood tone on the drawers and top. It was a great choice. We used “Minwax True Black” and “Varithane Carrington” for the wood tone. The two colors married well to create a dynamically elegant piece of furniture. 

Two Drawer Dresser After

She had also wanted artistic gold tones to highlight the bottom decorative scallop and edging as well as the natural curves along the bottom front and side edges. 

After Jim finished with the stain, I applied a craft ink called “Vegas Gold,” to achieve the accent paint she had wanted. I used a small sponge to dab the ink on the scallop decorative area and switched to a tiny paint brush for the thin criss-cross lines on the drawer fronts. I love doing the “crafty” parts of restoration as this gives it a unique look that stands out from the rest. This one was a real beauty.

Antique Rocking Chair New Caned Seat

Here's another old beauty of a rocking chair that need the broken caned seat replaced. Like many older chairs with caned seats, they tend to get broken after years of use because the cane gets brittle and if a child happens to put their knee onto it, well, there goes the caning with a hole in the middle. If the caning is slightly bent in the middle, it can be made taut again by placing a damp towel on the seat overnight. This technique softens the cane, thus tightening gradually when it dries and giving it more use, at least for a little while. But when it completely breaks through, the only alternative is removing the old,

Antique Rocking
Chair After

broken cane and replacing it with new cane. This is a “strand” cane chair, which means that it has holes surrounding the chairs seat where the cane strands get woven through. This is a seven-step process that is quite tedious, but if you listen to music or a podcast (like I do), it’s not so bad. It’s actually pretty relaxing once you get into the groove of it and allow your fingers to work their magic. 

For this chair, I used 2.25mm fine caning. This is based on the size caning that was in the chair originally. There are methods to measure the distance between the center to center holes to determine the proper size caning to use, but I prefer just to measure the existing old cane to make sure it will fit since the hole technique isn’t always accurate. The reason is that when many of these very old chair were made, whoever drilled the holes didn’t always measure the exact distance between holes as well as the size of the holes, therefore to use just the holes is not the more accurate way to get the proper new caning installed. 

In my experience, it’s better to use a slightly narrower size than one that is too large as this will be a real problem during the final binding step. If the cane is too big and overfills the holes, it’s nearly impossible to get the final strands through the holes without pushing the cane back out of the holes you’ve worked so hard to get securely in place.

This was to date my very best caning job because everything flowed smoothly and the caning was even and straight. The trickiest part was the the curved arm was attached very closely to the holes on that part of the seat, so the arms had to be lifted up enough so that I could thread the caning through the 6 or 7 holes that were very close to the bottom of the armrest. Some of those holes were drilled at an angle, so that made caning in those areas even more challenging as I tried to find the angle of the hole. However, once that was completed, the rest was easy by comparison. Caning is always done with the first step going front to back, underneath, then pulled through the hole and brought forward again. You repeat this process from the center all the way to the right (or left) side then finish off the other remaining side in the same manner. The next step is horizontal, left to right, starting in the back upper corner of the chair, following the same weaving. 

Third step is going over the first step, keeping the strands to the right of the first vertical strands. This is so that when you weave the fourth step, you go over step 3 and under step 1. This is the actual “weaving” part of caning which will set up the diagonal weaves that go from the upper right to the lower left corners. Finally, you weave from the upper left to the lower right corners, going under vertical and over horizontal one way then the opposite for the other side. 

Binding is what finishes off the top. A slightly wider section of caning is measured around the circumference of the chair. This covers up the holes with sections of caning coming up and going down the same hole, pulling tightly to keep the top edge secure. After this is done, you tap in a 1/2” finishing piece to plug the hole(s) where the caning started. It sounds a lot more complicated then it is, but if you follow the steps, you too can become a caning master. It’s definitely a great skill to have, some call a “dying” art as not many people are doing this anymore. It’s also a unique and creative way to add texture to your home with caned pieces such as speaker covers, cabinets and footstools in addition to chair seats and backs.

Here’s the video of the final step of me caning this rocking chair:

https://draft.blogger.com/blog/post/edit/5936537173467203420/6863734281706129925

Oak Dresser Hidden by Green Paint

 

Dresser After Stripping

Dresser Before Stripping

This little dresser is similar to a few others we’ve done that had the same overall look and design. However, this one was painted green. In our experience, sometimes when a piece of furniture is painted, there’s a good reason for it. Upon stripping this little dresser, we discovered that one of the drawers had a “patch,” which meant that someone had added a different type of wood that didn’t match the original oak that was used when it was built.

Luckily we were able to apply the stain so that it covered the entire piece in a way that looked as it would have looked originally. Likely, it had never been stained, just painted after it was built. It was old though.

When painting furniture, it usually doesn’t matter if wood styles are mixed because the paint covers it all evenly. But when a person wants something stripped and stained, refinished per se, if the wood is patched with non-original wood, this results in a variance of stain colors since different types of wood accept stain differently. 

A good example would be if you apply a dark stain to a light wood such as pine, it would certainly darken the original raw wood but wouldn’t be as dark as if you used the same stain on walnut, which is a darker wood to begin with. It’s always easier to go darker upon refinishing/restoring but much harder to go lighter. Not to say that it isn’t possible to do this as it all depends on the type of wood that was stained originally. Sometimes you simply don’t know what the raw wood will look like until it is stripped as years and years tend to oxidize the wood, making it darker than the original stain. Most of the time the wood, when stripped and completely sanded, is much lighter than the old finish. This allows for plenty of stain choices as it is fun to experiment with how the various stains draw out the wood’s original beauty. This is one of the most rewarding aspects of refinishing...seeing the final results when applying the stain. Ah, it’s pretty once again!

Artistic End Table

End Table Before

Leather on an end table such as this was commonly used for furniture as a decorative effect for the top. It worked nicely when new, but over the years these tables' leather got pretty beat up. Scratches, gouges, tears and discoloration became more common than shiny new leather and it no longer looked pretty, just old and worn out.

End Table After

While I wasn't quite sure what I would do to replace the leather which was peeling up on one side, it needed to be completely removed, which had proven to be quite a task, as the non-lifted portion adhered quite well. I had to use a small heat gun to soften the adhesive enough to carefully slip my putty knife under the leather and slowly peel it off the wood. It took about 30 minutes, but I was successfully able to lift the last corner of the leather and tear it off. Goodbye old leather, hello new design.

I used a chisel to scrape remaining paper left by the leather section, then sanded the surface smooth. While I was unsure exactly what I would do to replace the leather, I knew that when the time came, I'd have exactly the right treatment, so I got to work on the rest of it. I stripped, sanded and stained the end table using cherry stain, which brought out the gorgeous tones in the cherry wood the table was made from. Making a decision on stain can be tricky, since you don't really know how it will look until you apply it. A darker stain would have hidden much of the wood grain, so cherry was the perfect choice for this end table.


Once stained, I put this table aside while working on other furniture items for this project, (while my I left my subconscious work on the creative side of how to make the top stand out). Eventually I had formulated an idea which involved my trusty carpenter, my husband Jim. I had asked him to make custom veneer sections out of oak and mahogany, so he sliced up sixteen 1-1/2" sections of veneer, more than enough to experiment with a workable design for the tabletop.

End Table After

Using the freshly cut veneer sections, I laid out the pieces and worked up a design, much like one would put together a puzzle, only you create the design as you go. It took a while as I played around with the length of each piece, layout and design, but eventually I had created a random pattern I was satisfied with, then applied adhesive to the table and each veneer section, then let everything dry for fifteen minutes before I carefully positioned each section into place. There's no forgiveness when you work with adhesive cement on both sides of the wood. Once they're down, they're down, so it's a good idea to "dry fit" them before you apply the adhesive.

After sanding the tabletop to get all the veneer sections level, I applied golden pecan stain. Because of the two distinct woods, each wood had taken on a different tone, which created an interesting, artistic and contemporary tabletop. Once the stain was dry, I applied two coats of polyurethane to the lower areas and legs of the table and three coats to the top for added protection. It looked fabulous! This was definitely one of my favorite projects as I was able to blend the craft of refinishing, with the art of creating a custom made veneer design that gave this old beauty a modern, updated look.

This table was one of four pieces of furniture we did at the same time. Click on the links below to see the others:

http://finalefurniture.blogspot.com/2017/04/antique-secretary.html
http://finalefurniture.blogspot.com/2017/04/antique-writing-desk.html
http://finalefurniture.blogspot.com/2017/04/antique-piano-bench.html