Do you feel like your furniture has lost its old glory? Does it look less appealing than it used to a few years back? Then you can be assured that it is time for furniture restoration. It is a professional method with which you can retain the furniture’s aesthetic value.
The Importance of French Polishing:
Along with upgrading the aesthetics, furniture restoration makes your valuable possession functional again. One effective way to restore your furniture’s past glory is to try French polishing. It involves using shellac to attain a smooth finish on your old fixtures.
More About Vital Steps of French Polishing:
If you do not know about French polishing in detail, you are in the right place. In the following section of this blog, we talk about the steps involved in French polishing in Edinburgh for furniture restoration.
- Building the Base: If you thought that the renovation experts directly applied shellac on a pad to the furniture, you were wrong. The key is to build a proper base before applying it on a chair, sofa or other fittings. Typically, one mixes 20-25% solid blends of shellac in ethanol or denatured alcohol. The wood on the furniture tends to absorb more shellac when it’s porous.
- Forming the Pad for Application: Wrapping a piece of cloth can be a nice pad to apply the shellac solution. Ensure that the outer wrapper is strong and smooth, as wrinkles can reduce the efficiency of the restoration process. Binding a soft cloth into a ball or an ovoid can also greatly help.
- Flowing on the Finish: Applying the shellac and denatured alcohol mixture is the basic practice in French polishing. Applying flow to the finish is important to get a better effect. After soaking it in shellac, the professionals apply the absorbent centre material on the pad. Then they apply the pad on the wood in overlapping circles.
- Applying the Lubricant: After dipping the pad in the solution, you should move the pad around the surface. To enable better gliding of the pad, you can apply a drop or two of any oil or lubricant. You can also add 20% mineral spirits to the shellac mixture.
These are a few basic steps of French polishing that you should know. To get the furniture restoration process done by an expert, you can contact Bevens Furniture Restoration. They are experts who have been in this field for many years. To learn more, you can visit their website today.