For a variety of reasons, people place vintage furniture with “good bones” at the curb. The EPA estimated more than 12.2 million tons of furniture were dumped in landfills in 2018. There is value and interest in saving and restoring these pieces. But saving vintage furniture and giving it a new life needs a community effort
This piece served a long and useful life for a local family, but when a move was imminent the old finish, broken veneer and bowed bottom shelf suggested its time may have been up. Fortunately, this neighbor reached out to the community and I was lucky to receive her generosity.
After a thorough cleaning I scraped the old finish off by hand to get a detailed look of the underlying veneer condition. Not good. In addition, the bottom shelf was extremely bowed and the bottom veneer was falling off in large chunks. I stripped the veneer and saved it to repair missing pieces on the top and middle shelf. Then I cut saw kerfs the length of the bottom which allowed me to clamp it back together flat using epoxy glue. After laminating a new sheet of veneer to the bottom and making new holes for the legs, it was ready to be reassembled.
Next was the top’s veneer. It was extremely thin and had bubbled up and split down the middle. That seam had been previously sanded so much the underlying base wood was visible. I incised the bubbles with a scalpel and injected glue with a syringe, then clamped a flat board to it. Only partially succeeding, I had to use a hot iron over a cloth to reactivate old glue under the veneer, and “press” the top as flat as I could. I followed with filler, sanding and sealing. To evoke an Art Deco look I chose a sienna-colored stain and black mineral paint. I color-matched the patches, and added a durable gloss topcoat. I replaced the old pulls with very Deco-era brass ones. Done!
Local pickup Takoma Park, MD
Dimensions: 14”D x 30”W x 33”H
$300. Cash or Venmo.
For a variety of reasons, people place vintage furniture with “good bones” at the curb. The EPA estimated more than 12.2 million tons of furniture were dumped in landfills in 2018. There is value and interest in saving and restoring these pieces. But saving vintage furniture and giving it a new life needs a community effort
This piece served a long and useful life for a local family, but when a move was imminent the old finish, broken veneer and bowed bottom shelf suggested its time may have been up. Fortunately, this neighbor reached out to the community and I was lucky to receive her generosity.
After a thorough cleaning I scraped the old finish off by hand to get a detailed look of the underlying veneer condition. Not good. In addition, the bottom shelf was extremely bowed and the bottom veneer was falling off in large chunks. I stripped the veneer and saved it to repair missing pieces on the top and middle shelf. Then I cut saw kerfs the length of the bottom which allowed me to clamp it back together flat using epoxy glue. After laminating a new sheet of veneer to the bottom and making new holes for the legs, it was ready to be reassembled.
Next was the top’s veneer. It was extremely thin and had bubbled up and split down the middle. That seam had been previously sanded so much the underlying base wood was visible. I incised the bubbles with a scalpel and injected glue with a syringe, then clamped a flat board to it. Only partially succeeding, I had to use a hot iron over a cloth to reactivate old glue under the veneer, and “press” the top as flat as I could. I followed with filler, sanding and sealing. To evoke an Art Deco look I chose a sienna-colored stain and black mineral paint. I color-matched the patches, and added a durable gloss topcoat. I replaced the old pulls with very Deco-era brass ones. Done!
Local pickup Takoma Park, MD
Dimensions: 14”D x 30”W x 33”H
$300. Cash or Venmo.
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