Restoration week.

Sanding down in preparation of laying new baize

Stripping down the old finish by setting the piece on fire. Exciting.

We found a gun in an old cabinet we were restoring. Even more exciting.

Veneer repairs. A spot of paint and polish and it will look good as new.

The gods of woodworking appear to have decided that I haven't done enough sanding for my day job, so as part of restoration week, I've got to do some more (and by hand). I've really enjoyed this week overall - we've had a guest tutor in, Simon MacIntyre, who specialises in furniture restoration, and he's been excellent. Plus, the good news is that he will be back some time in Term 3 as well.

I find it quite difficult to think in 3D, so its nice to have a piece to disassemble and see how it all fits together. Especially if there are any tricky bits like hidden hinges or secret compartments. Its also been very interesting to see the different types of furniture which have come in and the areas which are the stress points over time. Joints are of course the number one area of breakage and can mostly be salvaged by the application of a little glue or a nail/dowel or two. You would also be surprised at the amount of difference a new coat of wax makes.

In project land, things have been going a little less smoothly. The lack of timber for my project has resulted in me spending a lot of time this week planing down planks and gluing bits (each 1 cm thick) together to make a block large enough for me to work on (35cm required). That's a lot of planing and cutting and gluing up. You lose so much wood in the planing process - a block of wood which starts off 2 inches thick often ends up less than an inch thick once its all flat, due to variances in thickness all round. Still, I think I now have most of my wood, barring a one or two small pieces and hopefully things will start coming together now.