The dresser completed its final trek today, arriving into our guest room late this afternoon. We spent the last few days stripping, sanding, staining, varnishing. Rob had never attempted to refinish furniture before but I spent the summer of 2001 refinishing my hardwood floors by hand and my dresser’s top when I came home from England in 2006. My dad had the space and all the tools so when we returned from Oregon, we unloaded the dresser there, instead of in our garage.
The dresser was left by the prior owner of Rob’s parents’ first home and they moved it to Florida with them in the late 70s. It shuffled between Rob and his brother and when we moved the last of Rob’s things to California, the dresser went back to his parents for safe keeping until we could get it back here. When Chris moved to Oregon, he brought it with him and we brought it home from Eugene.
There was extensive damage to the finish from stickers, contact paper, and broken veneer. We spent the first day stripping with a chemical stripper and sanding. Lacquer thinner was applied between sandings to get rid of all the sticky gunk. Rob learned how to use a sander and he’s becoming quite handy in the workshop. At the end of the first day, we had chosen a color and stained everything. It was starting to come together.
More after the jump…
After we stained it all, it was sanded again, cleaned up with lacquer thinner again and the painstaking varnish process began. Three coats of polyurethane takes 3 days to apply and cure. We applied the first coat on Thursday, sanded and reapplied on Friday, and once again on Saturday. On Friday, we drove over the Michaels and bought a tube of the infamous Rub N’ Buff. Amazingly enough, that stuff really works! The gross, tarnished handles were easily restored into lovely silver handles.
Finally, today we brought the dresser home to live in our guest room. This was the only piece of furniture Rob brought to California with him and it meant a lot to him to have it returned to it’s former glory. I’m not sure it’s ever been this pretty.
We did find some interesting artifacts as well. The bottom drawer was lovingly carved with the name CHRIS across the front and the artist signed his autograph inside. I know the photo isn’t great but if you look carefully, you can see it was signed not once, but TWICE, in addition to the outer carving. This way, CHRIS would always be remembered as owning this particular drawer.
It’s beautiful and we had no idea it would look this good. All the fumes, the mileage, the gratitude to Chris for bringing it most of the 3500 miles and for Rob’s parents for keeping it safe until we could figure this all out.
It’s going to have a new lease on life now.