Stencilling Art

This issue’s topics: A quick project, and, working with whites.
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This time of year is just about the end of garage and yard sale bargain hunting,
which is kinda sad, but the good news is that there aren’t as many people out
buying either, so the prices come down faster.

The weather is such that you don’t mind staying in, and hopefully you’ve got a
stack of projects to get you excited. The next five or six weeks are a great time to do small gift projects for those you love, or with whom you are trying to ingratiate yourself.

As an example, I recently finished a small stool that I picked up at a garage
sale for $4. It was an ugly orange-y colored maple with a deep scratch and
some water rings on the top. But it was perfectly sound and strong. I spackled
the scratch and gave it a quick scuff sanding before base-coating it with an off-white latex that was left over from some other project (who knows which one?).

Since I wanted some fine cracking, I next I put a few touches of hide glue here
and there. It was thinned with lots of water to keep the crackle small. Then I put
on a fairly bright yellow glaze. In the spots where the glue had been, the cracks
appeared, and I rubbed in some light brown artist’s acrylic so they would show

up a little better. Normally I would use artist’s oils so as to not re-wet the
  cracks with a water-based product. But these were small areas that I could work quickly, and wipe off the extra, and it would be dry in a few moments.

Next came some quick pinstriping freehand in a green (that was left over from the videos) and a small rose stencil on the top, done in just two colors. It took
longer to pick out the stencil (and cost more money, $6.00!) than the rest of the
project combined.

Still, the whole thing was less than twelve dollars or so, took less than three hours, and looks great in a country sort of way. The hardest part will be de-
ciding whose tree it’ll go under…

Pictures of it should be on the website in a couple of weeks.

Try something like this, -you’ll love it, and somebody will love getting it!

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From Dorian, some nice comments (thank you!) and a very good question about
her whites turning yellow, -and we’re not talking laundry here.

The problem is, when working with white or near-white colors in oil-based paints, after clear-coating them with varnish, they turn yellow(ish). What’s happening here?

White (oil) paints have always had a tendency to yellow over time. Usually that’s not a big problem, -it’s a pleasing enough color itself. It is magnified in locations that receive low light, the oil in the paint needs sunlight to keep it light colored. You may have noticed this effect when removing a picture from a wall and discovering a darker colored patch left behind. (This happens less often now because most walls are painted with latex paints which don’t have this problem.)

At any rate, furniture or trim or walls that are painted white and indoors will yellow with time. A room on the north side will have more trouble than a brighter south side will.

Now let’s switch to talking about varnish for a moment. We’re talking about the
oil-based varnishes here; alkyd, urethane, or polyurethane. Although they’re called
clear-coats, they’re not really clear. Just stare into a can of product and see if you can see the bottom of the can. You’ll notice that it’s anywhere from a little amber to a murky brown. Of course if you’re looking through a full can, that’s the equivalent of thousands of layers of brushed on finish, -but still, there’s obviously a color to it even in the few coats we would actually use.

So now you can see that if we add a couple of “clear” coats of something that has an amber cast on top of something that ambers in low light (the white paint), we’ll be doubling up on our ambers. But wait, it gets worse!

Even the “clear” varnish cuts down further on the amount of light reaching the
paint beneath, making it yellow even more, especially a few weeks or months later.

What about top-coating (clear-coating) the white oil paint with a water-based varnish instead? Water-based products don’t yellow, in fact, some of the clear products have a slightly blue tint to them. So the problem is lessened some-what, but not as much as you would think.

The water based “clears” are slightly more opaque than oil-based “clears,” so
they cut down a little more on the amount of light reaching the underlying white oil paint, which of course makes it more yellow…

Enough already, you say!? How can we win?

Well, some of the time, we can’t. If you’re highly desirous of creating a white white, faux marble (or other effect) in oil, try to change your mind. Learn to want and like a warmer, creamier white.

Or switch to water-based products, which will give you no trouble staying white.

The only problem you’ll have is if, like Dorian, (and I’ve been in this position, too), you want to do a floating marble style in pure white. You’ll remember that you can’t really do a floated technique in water-base, only oil. So just do as I do when I see a mirror-ed Rolls Royce once owned by Liberace coming up for auction; just try not to want it…
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Please forward this newsletter to interested friends.
Best wishes,
David Sorg
Article URL: http://www.finefurniturefinishing.com/newsletter7.html