Only A Few Bones... But Lots of Memories

This "once upon a time" little pedestal table came to the shop in pieces. The little decorative top's perimeter fence was made of cherry, but the table surface was gone; a memory. It had belonged to my customer's father. Somewhere along the timeline it was forgotten,  having been boxed up and placed in a shed or or garage for storage.

Now I had most of the decorative perimeter fence, although parts of this octagonal frame were badly deteriorated. And as I mentioned, the table top had become badly warped and so my customer had decided to toss it .  The pedestal was still intact,  but it's legs were variously damaged, and its decorative feet were broken or entirely missing. However, there were warm "what it used to be" memories. So, we moved forward!

Work began with the octagonal fence.

The fence looks generally OK, but as you can see, some of the pieces have deteriorated, no thanks to some water damage. I was able to minimize the deterioration's influence on my effort to pull and glue it together. So once it was prepped and glued up, it merely showed some "age cracks and dimples" and a few scars.

At the same time I acquired a great piece of veneer with some nicely placed knotty spots. I cut it to fit the prepped and glued up cherry fence. Then I was ready to do something with the pedestal and those sad legs and feet.

That effort began with the feet separated from the pedestal. I cut off the badly deteriorated spots on the foot ends and glued new wood into place.  Then I carved the swirls matching those swirls and grooves on the more intact feet. Then these were reattached to the pedestal.

Finally, when all the legs and feet were back in place, I prep-sanded the entire structure in anticipation of staining it. Yup, and I stained it with a cherry stain. After that the work was all happily "down hill."  I sprayed the coat of sealer and two coats of Mohawk Duracoat Satin Lacquer. So pretty!

I think it turned out really good. My customer was very happy. And that always makes my day. Yaaay.

OK,  that's WoodTalkin for today. Keep listenin. Why? Because your pieces really do have a lot of fun stories to tell.

THANK YOU!... Dick Brandow

PS: And for your information... I'm necessarily out of the shop this week supporting a family-related challenge. If you need to get through to me,  please leave me a text, or a voice mail, and I'll get back to you as your situation may require. Thanks again.

Almost a Gonner

Check out this precious old rocker. My customer reports to me that it came from the Oxford Hotel in downtown Denver. At that time, the 1890's, it was probably one of several like it made available to patrons on a closed hotel porch. So there's a lot of fun history here, and oh the stories it could probably tell!

The rocker is fashioned from Beech Wood. Looking closely, it has those distinctive Beech Wood grain flecks. And look at those wonderful turned spindles. Curves, curves, curves with predictable repetition and some splendid uniformity. It's all very typical of the Art Noveau style influencing the 1890's (and through about 1920). 

The rocker was originally finished with Tung Oil. Then somewhere along it's timeline it was stained and re-covered with the oil, but not before it was stained with a Mahogany like stain, over the original oil. The seat cut-out was tooled leather and

fastened in place with a marvelous brass buttoned ring, oh so pretty. A beautiful package for sure. But sadly, it is now exactly what time and circumstance does to everyone. With hope and maybe some promises of what it can be again, it's here in the Woodtalkin shop. Yaaay!

As I'm writing this much progress has been made. I took it apart piece-by-piece to carefully strip the flat surfaces and ALL the spindles. I'll be making a new spindle, because one has

been broken and lost. And one side of the seat is broken where the new spindles fit to support the arm. Those are being refabricated "as we speak." 

I chucked each spindle in my shop lathe in order to make the sanding effort more effective. If you've ever worked with Tung Oil you know that once it's cured on a piece it's extremely difficult to remove. And I had beaucoup intricate spindles to remove two layers of tung oil "sandwiching" the darker oil stain. Very challenging. Slowly but surely piece-by-piece they were all sanded and prepared for the next appropriate step in the process, dry reassembly. 

It's been a lot of work and very much a collaborative effort with my customer. From the beginning his plan has been to present the finished rocker to his wife, a wonderful Christmas present. It was all done a couple weeks before Christmas, but the seat insert was a project he and his daughter took on. Their effort resulted in a wonderful outcome. It is one I will certainly not forget.

 

The finished rocker is pictured below. So, what do you think. Amazingly beautiful I think. 

That's WoodTalkin for today. Be listening... WoodTalks.