Blog: Oak Panels, Doors and Staircase
Oak Panel, Doors and Staircase 1 (Posted 19/10/2021)
On this particular job, Artwood French Polishers we asked to tidy up and rejuvenate all the wood panelling, the staircase, all the doors and windows in a large Hall, Stairs and Landing, in Edenbridge. The client did not want it stripped as the cost would be too high. However, the wood looked very damaged, sun bleached, dry and hungry.
The following two videos show the before and after videos of the front door and surrounding panels and carvings.
Before Video
Watch the next video and you will see the doors, windows, sills, panels, architraves, skirtings and stringing, Rails, posts and sticks, fire place and all the carvings all in need of work. It all looks drab and in need of French Polish - hungry for colour! There were many chip, scuffs and scratches which needed to be taken care of, as well as a lot of sun bleaching. This means that some areas needed colouring more than others. Some parts were so bad that we needed to strip, neutralise, and then apply stain. This would require matching the new colour and polishing with the old.
The following two videos show the before and after videos of the front door and surrounding panels and carvings.
Again, please watch the video below to see all this.
Completion
The above pictures show some of the examples of how the work was tackled. Some areas had so much black that had worked its way into the grain, that we not only had to strip it, but also bleach it to get the colour back to bare wood before staining. It was also requested by the client that some areas, such as sills were lacquered to provide a much harder wearing finish. This acheived without the look and feel being noticeably different.
Over-polishing bleached wood is notoriously difficult, as different areas can react inversely. Starting from bare-wood is a much easier way to achieve an even finish. Sometimes we have to tailor our approach to the needs of the client.
Nevertheless, working within the scope requested by the client Artwood French Polishers were able to produce a finish that the client was more than satisfied with. We French Polished all this wood, brought out its colour and texture to provide a much deeper and even finish.
Finally below you will see pictures and videos of the finished job.
How to Accomplish the Work?
The best way to have approached this job would have been to strip, stain, then re-polish. This though would have taken more than twice as long, and been far more expensive. The client did not want to wait over double the time before they could move in and believed they would be happy with an over polish job. These, then, were the constraints we were working with.
Even though some parts had to be stripped, due to decorators over the years attempting to provide solutions to fading and such like, the vast majority could be over coloured, by Artwood making a bespoke colour to enrich the look of the wood. Below you will see some pictures of the work in progress.