Monday, May 16, 2016

a tad too posh?

Well, I've been busy making small repairs for the house and fixing the closet we bought together with the mahogany desk last week. It's a 3 drawers closet with a shoe compartment that broke and somebody replaced with particle board that exploded inside the closet and served the two spiders who lived in there to decorate their houses.

So I had to change it, and since it's not an exposed surface, I could use the chance to practice more french polish, a la chilensis of course.


 I used cedar since had a wild grain part laying around that I could happily resaw for a bookmatched piece.

As you see in the background, the splayed legs bench is still not finished, nor have I finished planing it either. I brought the piece so julia could check the finish and see if she likes it for the bench. She does.

So it seems I'm getting a helper, I reckon that you need ca. 10hours per m^2 of french polish.

Oh, why chilean way? No sandpaper, no pumice no nada. I'm filling the grain with the same shellac and it's taking long. I should have watered the surface before the last planing since the grain raised a tad with the alcohol. I first gave it a few coats of pure shellac with the brush. Spiriting off every 2 coats or so to keep things uniform. Then switched to shellac with sandarac and benzoe and a cotton pad. The same, apply two coats then spirit off.

This is the closet btw.

That panel was in the trash and a neighbour called me to pick it up. Maybe a guitar top? The panels are pretty much perfectly quartersawn.

This is the hole my shellac-ed board will cover.


Some marks, I like to leave marks too


and a broken door being repaired.

 more cedar

 and the bookmatched pattern.


Need to glue some drawers, clean more, and nail everything back together. Then julia can paint it and we move it downstairs for our bedroom.



1 comment:

  1. nice nice...
    bueno ver que sigues dándole a todo!
    1Abrazo
    david

    ReplyDelete