On Site Furniture Repair and Touch-up in the Kennesaw, Marietta areas
The other day I went to Cartersville, GA to repair an armoire.
The bottom of a leg, and trim around it was completely missing. It was broken off when it was moved, and the piece was lost.
I had a chunk of Mahogany with me in the car that was left over from a recent job. I measured for the dimensions, and cut the leg to length. I also had a piece of trim that matched, and I cut that up using a cheap Stanley miter box.
The leg finished up nicely, and the armoire now has a new leg!
Zeke Willard
Today I repaired a teak table. The corner was damaged when a mover dropped it while trying to carry it. It was extremely heavy so two movers should have tried to move it.
They were probably used to the light fake wood. This was solid.
Below are the before and after photos.
Before:
After:
I had to fill the damage, and square it up. Lightly sanded, and touched up the antique/ weathered look. I had to mix and match colors to get the right match. The customer did not know which corner I repaired!
Zeke Willard
This month I will be joining a writing challenge created by home blogger, Myquillyn Smith. Every day this month I will be writing on the topic of Furniture Repair. I will be mainly posting before and after photos of repairs, and discussing how I repaired it.
I live in the Atlanta, Ga area, and have been doing furniture repair as a profession for over 15 years. I am excited about this writing challenge, and I hope you enjoy what I post! If you have any questions, or comments feel free to leave some feedback.
Below are the posts for the month. Hopefully at the end of the month there will be 31 posts including the intro!
1.Intro Post (You are here)
3. Armoire missing mahogany leg
4. Cherry file cabinet gouge repair
7. Conference Table graffiti repair
15. Decorative Concrete Table Base Repair
16. Dark Mahogany Secretary Busted Edge Repair
18. Carving a Missing Rosette on an antique Mirror
19. Repairing a Hand Made Cherry Table
20.Repair to White Laminate Cubicle
21. Chip Repair to Antique White Dresser
24. American Girl Doll Table Repair
27. Finish Repair to side of Cabinet
30. High Back Dining Chair Repair
31. Decorative Coffee Table Repair
Zeke Willard
A few weeks ago I worked at Twitter Atlanta’s new headquarters. It is located on Ponce, in the old Sears bldg. This was a new renovation, and all of the furniture was brand new. My mission was to repair all of the nicks, and scratches according to a punch list.
I did some work on the conference table below. Apparently some tools fell while workers were installing lighting.
And these were dings I had to repair. They are the lighter marks going across the grain of the wood. I had to use the Burn-in method to fill the damage.
Before
After
I also had to go over all of the chairs, and tables in the break room. There were various nicks, and scratches on the tops, and I did a little touch up on the metal black edges.
Everything went well. And of course I had to tweet about it! Follow me at @zekewillard
This past week I have been touching up a lot of desks at GSU. They had their open house this week so I had to work around that. I also had to work around construction people, that probably bumped the desks after I left. Notice the ladder below. No problem though, they are providing future work!
These desks were a pleasure to work on. They had numerous gouges, and dents. Corners busted you name it. The wood that was used was sycamore, and I mainly used a technique called burning in to do the repairs. I used a butane knife to melt filler into the defects, and I had the perfect color burn-in stick to do the job.
I also ran into an old buddy that I used to work with over 12 years ago. He was touching up the wood panels, while I was touching up the desks. Apparently a different company hired him to do the panels.
Anyway the Main Law Auditorium was amazing, and the job was a success. It was three floors with 2 lecture rooms on each floor, and the Auditorium. I am expecting a call to go back soon, and maintain the wood. Job Security!
The other day I worked on this large 22 foot conference table.
It was cherry and a very expensive table.
I found out that the company that owned the table had their annual take your kid to work day.
Unfortunately, while one of the lawyers was with a client, the child was left alone sitting at the table drawing pictures. As he looked at the beautiful finish on the table, he thought it was a good idea to add his name to the top. He was able to scratch in most of his name until his parent caught him in the act!
She was told not to worry about it by her boss, but she did not want this to be a reason down the road for losing her job!
She decided to look up a furniture guy, and was referred to me by another customer.
I have repaired graffiti damage before in elevators, and other pieces of furniture. I filled the damage, and camouflaged it so that it was not as noticeable. She made the remark that it looked brand new again! She breathed a sigh of relief, and got some points with her boss for taking care of the damage.
Sorry about the glare in the pictures. Whatever I tried I could not get a good picture with my Android phone.
Zeke Willard
Every once in a while I go down to the shop to just plane some boards. It is relaxing hearing the swoosh of the hand plane against the wood as I cut.
It takes practice, and technique to plane a board flat with no marks from the cutter.
If you curve the blade, and go at an angle it can help. Also doing end grain can be a challenge. Spelching can occur among other issues.
I own several planes. A number 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, and 7. I also have a few block planes. I have a #6 1800’s woodie that I am eventually going to refurbish.
In my work I mainly use small block planes to smooth out edges, or trim down an inlay. When I have to fill large areas on furniture the block planes also come in handy.
I mainly use the larger planes when I make parts for furniture, or if I get a chance to make a furniture piece. I try to incorporate hand planes in my work whenever I get a chance.
My daughter calls the shavings “curlys”.
Daddy can you make some more curlys for me? Yes Victoria, let’s go down to the shop.
Curlys
Zeke Willard
I recently worked on a Decoy Duck. During a move it was damaged on the back tail feathers. I had to reconstruct the damaged areas, and match the color so that it would blend in. The damage was very small, but it took a lot of patience because the repair had to be close to perfect.
The moving company that damaged it wanted to just cash out the cost of the decoy. The customer refused to do this because it was signed by former Atlanta Braves pitcher, Denny Lemaster!
It was not only signed, but carved into the bottom of the duck. She also stated that decoys sell for over a thousand dollars. And this one is signed by Denny Lemaster! 😉
I am a huge Braves fan, but I have never heard of Denny Lemaster. I also was a big baseball card collector when I was a boy, so I thought I would have heard of him. Maybe he came up for a cup of coffee with the Braves?
I decided to google his name. Here is what I found. He pitched for a few different teams from 1962 to 1972 and had a record of 90-102. He did pitch a 1 hitter for the Atlanta Braves.
So there was my answer. He was somewhat of an obscure player, and I must not have come across any of his cards when I was a kid. I do have to mention that if you last a decade in the show you have to be good.
Another interesting job to come into the shop.
Zeke Willard
First I want to say that I am a furniture repairman, not a doll house repairman. Somehow they keep on arriving at my shop!
Caleb, (Helper Monkey), said no not again!
This one had several small parts broken off on the top, and some candy pieces missing on the sides. I bought some real gum drops to replace missing ones. I coated them with epoxy, and then I lightly sprayed a little color on it to emulate the color of the other gum drops.
This one was not as tedious as the other doll house.
Everything went very smoothly, except when I brought the extra gum drops inside right before dinner. The 4 year old said over, and over again. ” I want a gum drop! I want a gum drop!” The 2 year old heard her, and started to join in the chant. I decided just to toss them so they would not ruin dinner, or teeth for that matter.
I had to take extra care when I delivered the candy house. I did not want any more gum drops breaking off.
Zeke Willard
The other day I did some repairs at Fort Benning. It is an army base near Columbus, GA.
The Government is renovating an old building built during WWII. It has spanish tiles on the roof, and this place is huge. Of course the elevator was not in service, so I got my workout for the day lugging my toolbox up and down 3 floors.
I worked on a bookcase with a gouged corner, a desk hutch with stain missing, and a busted corner on a desk. Pics below of the desk.
Before
After
It took me a few hours to finish, and afterword I visited the National Infantry Museum, which I thought was great.
The admission was free, and there was more stuff to look at than I had time for. Next time I have a job there I will go back, and continue where I left off.
I took a pic of a typical day for boot camp. First Call is at 4:45am! I admire the self discipline it takes to do this schedule day in, and day out. Of course they do have a lot of external motivation.
Zeke Willard