Old Chair, Renewed

A cute chair from the beginning of the 20th Century, in solid beech.

I have fully restored it, as the structure was still solid but it had suffered the attck of wood worms; and also given it a fresh new look -its lovely features were covered with an old, gloomy dark varnish that had to go! I have stained the seat and painted the rest with several, really thin layers of an off-white tone that lets the wood grain show, then distressed the surfaces to highlight the soft angles.

As I always do, the piece is protected with clear varnish and polished to get a smooth satin finish.

Measures: 84cm high, seat 33x 35cm, 47cm high

THE MAKING OF:
Here on the right -the chair, prior its renewal.

Below -stripping the whole thingdown to expose the lovely beech wood, then treating it against woodworms.

Once treated and dry, filling all the holes left by the woodworms. That had to be sanded once again, and then the fun part started: kind of white-washing the structure with several, really thin layers of a self made off-white tone. I applied it with the brush and immediately wiped almost everything off with a cloth. And repeat. It's a time consuming process, but the results are quite nice!

Once the staining of the seat was done (not shown), I distressed the painted surfaces to create even more interesting textures and shades of colour. The last step was varnishing and polishing.