A friend picked this up in Oregon, he didn’t buy it the first time he was there, but when his wife traveled to Oregon, he had her go find it, which she did with much trouble. For some reason he doesn’t like the color paint and wanted it restored?
I used a citrus based stripper [in a modern spray can, well it was modern paint] to remove the paint, I did one section at a time, masking the surrounding surfaces with modern blue painter’s tape [it was modern paint!].
After the stripper had been washed and scrubbed of with an old modern plastic toothbrush [it was modern paint/stripper], and water, which I allowed to dry completely. I washed down with alcohol to remove the residue of stripper. I also used a brass wire brush to remove some of the residue in the grain and fine crevices of the details of the carvings.
This is a picture with half of the frame treated with Moses T’s Reviver, showing the difference, I then treated the entire frame with Reviver.
I then used a bit of Reviver and added some burnt umber, yellow ocher, and red iron oxide dry powdered pigments and applied a thin coat of this stain over the entire frame. I also stripped the back and treated it in a similar manner, taking special care that the rebate for the mirror was stripped and stained. Failing to do so, it will show up when the mirror is installed.
The final photograph is with a coat of very thin shellac. After I took this picture, I did some minor touch up with shellac and burnt umber and red iron oxide pigments, then applied another fine thin coat of shellac.
The next step will be gesso and bole then gold leaf on the sun carving. Should be fun.
Stephen
