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Another family heirloom saved from the abyss

This is such a honor for us , this vanity was made by the Elkin Furniture co in Elkin NC , some time around the turn of last century ,,the only information I can find on line says they moved their original factory in 1907 the website has a picture of the building on loan from the in Surry county NC historical society , my guess is the piece is made of American Chestnut , My guess is the wood is well over 200 years old , what a honor to see some else's work from a century ago and to restore this thing in hopes it will last another 100 years . I cant begin to explain how fragile it feels , just received the new casters that are so close to being identical it is shocking . it had a couple lose glue joints{{assuming they were hide glue}} and the old wood casters were there but chipping away ,the stool still has the original material on it , we wont try to do anything to it until we can find matching material , I am afraid if we try to clean it it will just fall apart, the wood stool its self is in wonder full condition needing very little if any repairs We hated to take it down to bare wood but it did need it , we will sign and date our repairs and what small bit of information we have found to go with it . I have to say the quality is as good as anything that can be made today .

Very nice work, much appreciating what you're doing and why you do it!

Chris

Thanks Chris .

I am also glad these furniture pieces are seeing a new lease on life. Great that you know the history of it as well. On these antique finishes, do you strip them or sand them off? What stripper do you use?

use of strippers depend on the situation ,I would try to save that for a paint removal , this one ,,sand paper,,, 220 grit and higher , along with card scrapers for the detail work ,then steel wool , strippers can be harsh and sand paper can leave marks . in this case after the wood conditioner is used it was stained again with American Chestnut to match the contrast of some of the grain , then a light steel wool and then we finished with a polly urethane ,,,since no one wants to wax their furniture any more,, , I would rather have finished it with shellac and wax , originally my best guess was it was a varnish or lacquer finish since it was done on a production line . also I like to mix and spray the finish using a gravity spray gun instead of a brush , the mirror was not touched in any way except several coats of paste wax to bring back its luster and amazing details . jmo

With out the mirror

we havent installed the original knobs yet , I thought about polishing them since they are bras but they will stay as they are with the original patina .

Hobbyman2 wrote:use of strippers depend on the situation ,I would try to save that for a paint removal , this one ,,sand paper,,, 220 grit and higher , along with card scrapers for the detail work ,then steel wool , strippers can be harsh and sand paper can leave marks . in this case after the wood conditioner is used it was stained again with American Chestnut to match the contrast of some of the grain , then a light steel wool and then we finished with a polly urethane ,,,since no one wants to wax their furniture any more,, , I would rather have finished it with shellac and wax , originally my best guess was it was a varnish or lacquer finish since it was done on a production line . also I like to mix and spray the finish using a gravity spray gun instead of a brush , the mirror was not touched in any way except several coats of paste wax to bring back its luster and amazing details . jmo

Thanks. I have two old radio cabinets. The first one, someone before me had ripped out the electronics and used it as a storage cabinet, so it has become extra storage in my dining room. I sanded off the old finish a long time ago, so at one point the cabinet looked very similar to your picture here. What do you use for the corners and crevices, a card scraper perhaps? I bought one of those detail/profile sanders and it helped, but it was still really difficult to get the old finish out of those crevices. Just wondering if you have any tips for that. On the large flat areas, sanding worked, but I felt like I had to remove too much of the wood to completely remove all of the old finish. This is why I was wondering if I should have attempted using stripper instead of sanding. The 2nd cabinet, I haven't gotten around to refinishing yet. It is an RCA Victor tube radio from the mid 1940's, I believe. I have been on again, off again restoring the electronics in it for many years now. Hopefully one day I will finish it and bring it back to life and restore the outer cabinet as well. I appreciate any tips you have for working on older furniture like this.

I picked up one of those old vanities a few years back. Mine isn't as old as yours, and it isn't made from Chestnut. You don't find furniture that old in this part of the country as it wasn't settled here until the late 1800s.
My vanity is walnut, and it was in quite good shape. The finish all had to be removed and redone, but it was complete with its original mirror so it was worth a bit of work.