When I came across this good old chest at the antique mall it was cluttered with stuff. I almost missed it and then like so many other antiques it grabbed ahold of me and said Wait, There’s More! Kind of like a puppy wanting to be chosen and brought home.
I din’t really need a chest of drawers, did I? Well it certainly wasn’t what I was looking for. The old hmmm, hey I might be interesting, and come on, look at my key holes! My leg has been chewed by a puppy but I’m still full of pep. I’m not exactly on my very last legs. Yes, I creak a bit when you shove me around and the drawers are a bit wonky when you open and close me but hey I’m taller then your existing chest and I have an extra drawer.
After a couple of days of contemplation and negotiation the chest came home with me. It got put in the bedroom, loaded up and sat. And sat and sat some more. Sometimes things just need to simmer. I just assumed that I was probably going to end up painting it but I knew I had to get the bedroom figured out first and I knew I had a real mess on my hands with that one. You can read about that here, here, and here. After a few months of limbo the chest got covered with a piece of plastic and the demolition began.
Room complete I had to figure out what to do about this chest.
In the end this beautiful cherry wood told me it wanted to breathe, and those key holes said no way, you are not going to cover me up. Nope not in my lifetime. But wait what about the area on the top where there is a drink ring and where the finish has worn thru,
and what about the bottom drawer where the dog treats must have been stored!
There are puppy scratches there and of course there is the leg that’s been chewed. What are you going to do about all that?
Well let’s just get out the trustee Briwax and the 0000 steel wool. Let’s just see if this is going to be enough.
Handling your antique up close and personal gives you a sense of its life. It begins to tell you it’s story, like the puppy scratches on the bottom drawer I would have never noticed, or the realization that the hardware wasn’t original to the piece but very old. The lock box that is missing behind one of the key holes or those very fine little grooves on the perimeter of each drawer. None of the imperfections are important to me and would never deter me from buying an antique if I loved the piece. It just becomes part of the romance. Really what kind of a story can you tell about a piece of furniture that you picked up at a big box store! Oh Oh I parked the car went into the store and saw this absolutely perfect piece of furniture, so I laid down my hard earned cash and bought that chest!!! Ok that was very snarky. Of course I have done that too. Sorry.
The first thing I needed to do after all the dust flying in my home was give it a good cleaning. I vacuumed it out and then washed it with a solution of hot water and Murphy’s Oil Soap. After letting it dry I polished the brasses with Wenol metal polish and a soft cloth.
Then it was time to start waxing the drawers. This is a very simple process and only takes just a bit of elbow grease. I use 0000 steel wool that you can pick up at any hardware store. 0000 is the finest steel wool you can buy. 000 or 00 are courser respectively. I would never use anything but 0000 on an antique. I didn’t touch this piece with any sandpaper first. It didn’t need it. Well I take that back. Where the leg had been chewed I did hit it with just a bit of 150 grit sandpaper just to smooth out the rough edges. I didn’t want to do too much because I didn’t want to go thru the grooves on the leg.
When applying wax I put some on the pad of steel wool and began to work it into the wood using a circular motion. When you’ve completed working it into the wood gently remove any excess and let it dry for about 15-30 minutes then buff with a lint free clean cloth.
(Minor elbow grease required). While buffing you will see a patina start to develop, it will become shinier and I keep turning the cloth and buffing until there are no streaks. Just repeat on all the drawers and you’re done. Moving on to the chest box again you just repeat. Where I had some damage on the top with the drink ring and the lacquer had worn off I just kept doing the same thing.
Easy, buff and done.
As the husband would say in his most sarcastic voice “It’s so Pretty”! But really it is, I’m so glad I didn’t paint it.
The wax evened out the tones from where the lacquer had worn off and you can’t even see the drink ring. And those old brasses?
Just saying!
Thanks for stopping
Shelley
