Best tip gleaned from forum!
Best tip gleaned from forum!
I do a tremendous amount of hand finishing of natural mouldings and today I had whitened a 10cm wide length and then washed a patina of blue-grey into the grain. In the past I used to use a rag dipped in a matt sealer and a load of elbow grease rubbing off the excess to leave a beautiful pearly white finish with the wood grain showing. Looks almost like ivory. However on one of the threads last year, someone posted a pic of a moulding and wondered how it was done and I think it was NYAF who responded with an experiment and mentioned steel wool being used to take off bits of colour. Man o man! what a glorious piece of info. Gone are the days of elbow grease - the wool works stunningly leaving a smooth satin finish. Forever in your debt NYAF.
Alan
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MITREMAN
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Re: Best tip gleaned from forum!
Hi fineedge,fineedge wrote:I do a tremendous amount of hand finishing of natural mouldings and today I had whitened a 10cm wide length and then washed a patina of blue-grey into the grain. In the past I used to use a rag dipped in a matt sealer and a load of elbow grease rubbing off the excess to leave a beautiful pearly white finish with the wood grain showing. Looks almost like ivory. However on one of the threads last year, someone posted a pic of a moulding and wondered how it was done and I think it was NYAF who responded with an experiment and mentioned steel wool being used to take off bits of colour. Man o man! what a glorious piece of info. Gone are the days of elbow grease - the wool works stunningly leaving a smooth satin finish. Forever in your debt NYAF.
Try different grades of steel wool and try using it with bees wax polish and buffing with muslin gets a great finish. Also try opening up the grain first with a coarse steel wool this will collect more paint when applied by rag and rub of with a damp shammy leather to remove the access. Adds some fly specks to age if required by flicking paint with a toothbrush onto the moulding.
Don't foget to charge a good price for your labour as hand finishing can take up a lot of frame making time.
Love to see some photo's of your finished frames.
"Rub-on-rub-off"
Cheers MITREMAN