Jumbletown treasures: revamped sideboards

[skinnycat]

these took a little cleaning up but well worth the effort.

[sparkwell]

Hi skinnycat

I think your sideboards are lovely great job and what a super picture montage too well done!

Sparkwell

[skinnycat]

thanks Sparkwell :-)

[maggied]

love your units and picture wall very retro well done

[sandramcs]

You make it sound so easy... " a little cleaning up" ! They look wonderful. Now, please share your cleaning tips. We have a sideboard in the hall, similar in style and wood to your second photo. It could do with some tlc, so would really appreciate your advice. Thank you in advance.

i have also been trawling through some of the other posts and if I had a hat would take it off to the creativity and energy, not to mention amount of elbow grease used by so many of you. Thanks for sharing your befores and afters.
Sandra

[skinnycat]

Hmm, it was a while ago Sandra but I remember light but thorough hand sanding with different grades of paper to remove the water rings and cigarette burns :-) I used black sanding paper (the type used for cars) for the final sanding, Then I went over the surfaces with pure alcohol (hardware store or pharmacy), this raises any stray wood fibers which I then lightly sanded again. I then applied teak oil 'watered down' with turpentine (one part oil to 3 or 4 parts turpentine). I let this dry thoroughly (overnight) and then lightly sanded (again:-). I repeated application until I was happy with the result then after a couple of days when everything was thoroughly dry I had a nice lustre but I wanted more shine so I applied thin coats of beeswax which I diluted with turps (I lightly heated the wax to melt it - CAREFUL!! Highly flammable). When dried again I buffed it to a high shine with very fine steel wool - size 0000 and then an old wooly jumper. Voilà! Here's a pic of the sideboard on the right part of the way through the process.
I'm by no means a furniture restorer so some might have an easier way to get the same results. I just went on instinct until I got the results I was happy with. If you give it a go don't forget to post the results :-)

[skinnycat]

P.s.
If your sideboard is veneer on particleboard (like my 2 door sideboard) you'll want to be very careful not to sand too aggressively so as not to strip off too much wood from the veneer (this happened to me in parts especially on the edges) good luck!

[sandramcs]

Skinnycat, you really went to a lot of trouble to give me the way to go about it! Thank you very much. I will take a photo tomorrow and sotre it till I get around to doing the job. I know I will need to have a few days on end so maybe Easter week will be the time. I will let you see the before and after photos. Once more, a million thanks, I am handless but if I do what you say i think I will succeed. best regards, Sandra

[unapam]

Beautiful! Well done.

[Eimear25]

Hi, SC these sideboards are amazing, I love the sheen, images are worthy of a chic interiors mag, well done

[junkista]

your sideboards look fantastically retro chic!! very professionally finished! and you've got space for two!! im green!

[Merienne]

These look truly amazing. Sideboards are my favourite piece of furniture, and these are so inspirational. I'm really impressed, and after reading this I'm trying my hand at one from a fellow jumbletowner.