An English Footstool and a side of Silver Leafing

Not much work has been done this week as I've been nursing an upper respiratory infection that first started out as allergies.  But I do have a few projects to show you that I managed to finish up before the tissues went-a-flyin'!

My fav is the antique English footstool that I picked up recently.  I decided not to mess with painting it since the wood is a warm rich color that doesn't need to be changed - just enhanced!

All the serious antique collectors just heaved a sign of relief.

I happen to have some leftover antique French hemp fabric from a previous project perfect for the job.  I took the old upholstery off - which frankly, there wasn't much left since it was already shedding all over the place.  The "horsehair" stuffing was still in really good shape so I left that in place.

All I had to do was give a muslin covering over some additional padding.

After hot gluing the French hemp in place, I just added some more leftover gimp that I had to finish off the edges.

She is a beauty now!

You may remember my first time journey into the world of gold leafing on a tray I did recently.  Well I finally got around to silver leafing it's sister tray.

I gave her a couple coats of ASCP in Graphite and then proceeded to apply the adhesive to just those places I wanted the silver leaf to be.  I was going for a cast iron/silver inlay look.

You can either use the Mona Lisa metal leafing kit with tear-off sheets or it's rub-on leaf kit.  It really depends on your project which one to use.  For flat-only surface, I would go with the rub-on sheets.  You just lay those down whole and then rub gently for them to adhere to your surface.  Use the sheets you tear apart for more detail and/or intricate work.  It's easier than the rub-on sheets which you may end up wasting a lot of like I did in the beginning.

I did "wrap" the leafing around the handles but made sure to tape off the areas I did not want the leafing to adhere to.

After all the leafing is applied, it's just a matter of applying a sealer and deciding if you want to put a coat of antiquing glaze on it - which I did.

She went into my booth alongside her "sibling".  They actually sold before I left the shop that afternoon!

Now I'm off to nurse my fever.  I MUST be better by tomorrow night as we're set to take the kids (minus the 7 year old), to a haunted hayride in the forest.  It's complete with those creepy clowns and people flying out of trees at you!  I bet the hubs will be the first to dig a hiding place in the middle of the haystack on the truck, LOL!  Hope I can video that for you.

Till then......

Vintage Resurrections