Refinished Dressing Table

This is a dressing table, seat, and mirror that a customer wanted "freshened up". It had been hers when she was very young and had just come back into her possession. The furniture was bought by her parents and somewhere along the way they had a friend paint it white. The friend that painted it used automotive paint which had yellowed over the years. My customer wanted it cleaned up and repainted since there were no areas that needed repair.

After discussing stripping might lead to more expense because of things like finding veneer hidden under the paint, we decided I would give everything a scuff sanding, apply a coat of white pigmented shellac, and finish with several coats a good quality latex paint. I loaded the pieces into my truck and took them back to my shop to begin work.

As I started sanding the mirror frame, I noticed everywhere the sander cut through the paint, the wood looked red. My first thought was it might be mahogany, given the age of the piece. If this was true, there might be some real beauty hiding under that paint. I decided to "take a peek" by sanding off the finish on half of the table top. As I sanded, I noticed the sandpaper cutting through the white paint to reveal a reddish color. I continued to sand through this and down to the bare wood. After removing the finish, I cleaned the dust off of the surface and wiped it down using a rag moistened with mineral spirits. What I found was not mahogany but cherry!

Now I wondered if the whole thing was cherry or just parts of it. I sanded a spot on one of the end panels to reveal there was cherry there too. Next, I tried the bench seat and found the same thing. Another nice feature revealed by the sanding of the bench top was the legs were set in through mortises in the seat with a small wedge driven into the ends.

I decided not to go any further with my work until I informed my customer of my findings and see if they wanted to change directions. They were so excited to find there was solid cherry under the paint, and after discussing my recommendation to strip everything and give it a natural finish, we agreed to new terms for the work involved.

The difficult part was all the stripping. Fortunately I was able to work inside for most of it, since the early spring weather here was still rather cool. After getting all the automotive paint off that I could with the stripper, I began the arduous task of sanding. There were plenty of places where the white pigment was still in the grain too deep for the stripper to remove. I sanded until I got it all out. This required lots of detailed work in some places.

Once the sanding was complete, I began applying the Watco Danish oil and rubbing it in. I finished up with a few applications of a good paste wax and a final buffing. My customers were excited to see the results when I delivered the finished pieces. I'm glad they decided to refinish instead of repaint. It would have been a shame to hide such beautiful wood.