Some good friends of mine asked for a recommendation on a repair shop and I mentioned to them that Rose Valley Restorations does good work for me, so they brought the chair to me to take in to John Hutchinson.  This will be the first of two short videos on the repair.

This is a repair that I or many of you would attempt on our own - a clean break in the crest of this antique chair. You might be tempted to throw some glue in the break and strap it down for pressure and be done with it. However, I’m a firm believer that for the modest cost that this will involve to get it done professionally, it is better to go that route so that the small details can be attended to properly.

In this case, properly means to embed up to 3 dowels to reinforce the crest against future instances where re-breakage might occur when this chair is exposed to mis-handling.  The insertion of dowels is not something I would have attempted myself.

You can view the video by using the player below or follow the instructions to view it in full-screen, stereo and High-Definition.

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A quick update on the table’s progress in this video. It is fully stripped and sanded and the quartersawn Oak shows in all it’s bare glory. We select stain for the wood and paint for the griffins.

Video Part I and Part II - if you haven’t already seen them.

You can view the video by using the player above or follow the instructions to view it in full-screen, stereo and High-Definition.

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Here’s Part II of the Merklen Brothers table refinish project.  If you didn’t view the first Part yet, I recommend you watch it first, here.

In this episode, I’m in the shop of my favorite local furniture restoration business, Rose Valley Restorations, and we go through a battery of tests to determine the best approach to stripping.

You can view the video by using the player below or follow the instructions to view it in full-screen, stereo and High-Definition.

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