subject: Old Wine In A New Bottle - French Polish [print this page] Old is gold, and there is no exception to this rule. Really, be it anything, your school-time drawings, first crushs memories, tickets of your first date, these are always emotional memories attached to certain things in life. Same is the case with furniture, which is more closely associated with the lineage of your family than anything else. If some of your oldest and most precious furniture is now getting tainted due to the effects of time, French polish is here to make your day!
A popular wood finishing method, French polish is being extensively used the world over these days. It is a very effective way of bringing a lustrous shine to high quality figured wood surfaces. Also, many think that French polishers use a special polish or technique to apply a regular polish in a new way. However, French polish is only a method to apply shellac-based polish on wood. Other ingredients of the method are oil, abrasives, pumice and alcohol.
To start the process, shellac is poured on a cotton fabric and mixed with a few drops of oil. Applying extremely thin layers of the mixture to the wooden furniture starts the application. The next step is to wait for the layer to dry out, which is followed by another layer, and then another. This should be followed 6-8 times to achieve the desired finish, allowing the shellac mixture to dry each time a layer is applied. However, while this process seems rather easy to be done, it actually requires a great deal of expertise to be done effectively. Hence, it is important that you hire professional French polishers to do the job properly. This is all the more important if the furniture is precious or too old, since that increases the risk of damage exponentially. Further, after the finish is done, you can also sell some of the furniture for a better price, in case you so desire.
