PLAN No. 523. REFINISHING METHOD FOR FURNITURE REPAIRERS

A furniture repair man in Seattle discovered the following method of refinishing American or printed oak, a clever imitation of genuine quartered oak:

Clean up the piece, whatever it may be; if it needs washing, give it a good scrubbing, and then an equally good opportunity to dry. If you want to replace the figure, and it is not generally worn off, mix some dry Van Dyke brown with stale beer or cider, and pencil in the flakes. This can be done with a long camel hair “striper,” or even with an artist’s brush about one-eighth inch in diameter. With a little practice, the grain of the wood can be followed so that each piece can have its general design carried out. When this graining process has dried, coat with shellac, then varnish.

The effect produced by this method was so artistic that he was offered a good salary to take charge of all such work in a large furniture store in the city, but there are hundreds of other places in this country where the same method can be employed with equally good results.