Friday, December 17, 2021

Does it shine yet?

I inherited some oak furniture when Uncle died. Originally it stayed in his flat but the current tenant didn't want it so we brought it home. It's lovely - and probably was expensive - but it had lost its shine. It looked quite dull. I realised it would never have the gleam of my other furniture because that is, I assume, lacquered or something, but it did look sad. So I decided to have a go.

First attempt at cleaning with vinegar and water.

If you look at the patch on the bottom right corner in the picture, that's the bit I've scrubbed. It's difficult to show in a photo but it was having an effect.
In this one if you look carefully you can see the difference. Top third untreated, middle third scrubbed with vinegar, bottom third cleaned with vinegar and olive oil.

And the finished product. Of course I keep going back and polishing it a bit more. I could get quite precious about this table.

I am feeling rather pleased with my morning's work. 


8 comments:

PipeTobacco said...

That is an especially pretty table….. and you work on it was really nice!

Just out of curiosity…. you may have no new news…. and that is fine of course…. but how is your fiction writing going? I always love hearing your insights about the process.

PipeTobacco

PipeTobacco said...

“You” = “your” in the above.

PipeTobacco

Boud said...

That's a great result. I used to use white vinegar and linseed oil on okd furniture. Nowadays I use olive oil and it doesn't seem to mind. Your table is probably quite dry, so the oil will be absorbed snd it will really glow.

Debra She Who Seeks said...

That really perked it up!

Kathy G said...

Nice work!

Cop Car said...

What a beautiful table top you have polished up. Congratulations!

Polly said...

That's a beautiful table and you've done a great job. Many years ago I had a mahogany dining table which someone (think it was elder daughter) was ironing on, and burnt it!! With the help of a friend we stripped the whole table and patiently French polished it, it turned out very well.

Tams said...

That's a huge improvement, it looks revived