Strippers welcome!

Times change and light colors are something that a lot of people find appealing .  A hundred years ago though there were amazing trees and the beautiful millwork derived from those trees was seen as the ultimate in attractive.  In this house over time, much of the millwork was painted-- a lot.  There were multiple coats of paint in the parlour and dining areas that looked like marshmallow cream slathered over the wood.  The light in the room was nice but the detail in the millwork was lost to a great degree...

Bring on the strippers!  

We wanted to take these rooms back to what they once were and we pleaded for Tony C's team at Tinker's to help us.  They have done some incredible furniture refinishing (as opposed to dancing ) and we asked them to treat these two rooms as if they were big pieces of furniture. Check out the shop at Tinker and Company too.  Sharon has great ideas! Here's their website.

  http://www.wix.com/tinkerandcompany/tinkers

 They came up with a great formula and multiple steps to remove the paint inch by inch and layer by layer.  They even had tools that were akin to those used by dentists so they could get into every nook and cranny...

  

They were removing stain, shellac, layers of grime and many coats of paint. The wood would get darker before it got lighter and let us not forget the four letter word inherent in these projects, L-E-A-D.  Notice that the workman have respirators on and as the general contractor, we have our room air scrubbers and venting to protect everyone.

It's unbelievably messy and it takes a lot of energy but it is like being on a treasure hunt.  

The carved detail in the wood that is revealed is gorgeous!

And this isn't even the finished product.  Tinker's is coming up with a magic stain formula and refinishing will commence when the electrical, plumbing and plaster work is completed in these two rooms. 

Stay tuned...