10/17/2026
Restorations are not for the faint of heart🤎
The amount of work and time and sweat to get it from that to this is A LOT. It may seem like magic🪄… but it’s definitely not!
Let’s go step by step:
1. Remove hardware and doors and hinges.
2. Apply a heavy glop of sticky, icky, smelly st****er. Wait.
3. Don’t let that dry out… scrape the sticky icky from all the surfaces and nooks.
4. Rinse with water or acetone.. scrub and scrub.
5. Sometimes repeat step 2-4 a second time.
6. Sand everything - flats and nooks.
7. Chisel, chisel, chisel away at the old veneer on the top.
8. Belt sand the top to remove the wood that won’t lift.
9. Mix the wood dust & wood glue to fill the gouged areas of the surface while maintaining the correct wood color.
10. Sand the top smooth again.
11. Assess repairs needed - glue and clamp cross supports and many pieces back onto the legs.
12. Glue the backing to remove 90% of warping and nail corners down (they arrived falling off).
13. Apply stain to everything using a brush and rag to get every little spot.
14. Apply a coat of clear polyurethane… three times.
15. Clean inside cubby’s and drawers; wipe to freshen up the wood.
16. Clean and polish the hardware.
17. Install doors. Install back trim detail.
18. Find old brass k***s for the top drawer because it arrived with hammer black new ones that didn’t work.
19. Carry the piece around trying to take a good after photo😅
20. Have anxiety leading up to pick up.
21. Be proud of yourself for another beautiful project.
I’m sure I left out a bunch of little things too! But it’s always a lot of work and half way through restorations, I want a desk job🤷🏻♀️
So show your furniture refinishers lots of love!
These old detailed buffers have always been my favorite🤎
