Several weeks ago, I asked for advice in making a finish that looked
like pitted metal, and the Groop gave me a number of good ideas.
I tried gesso, lacquers, acrylic texture medium, and all kinds of techniques.
I finally got the texture I needed duplicate the finish I was matching.
Here's what I ended up doing:
Starting with ordinary Oak dining chairs, I first painted them black with
M. L. Campbell's pigmented lacquer. Then I mixed up a silver glaze using
Mohawk's silver "bronzing" powder and Behlen's heavy bodied glaze base,
adding blue and yellow to it until it matched the table finish as seen through
3/4" of glass.
I sponged the glaze on sort of randomly with a small upholstery foam
applicator. I tried half a dozen applicators in several configurations before
I got the texture I wanted.
After applying glaze to a section, I squirted lacquer thinner in it from a
trigger sprayer set for a coarse spray. This made little craters in the
glaze, the size and texture of which could be controlled by how you
squirted the lacquer. After the glaze was applied, satisfactory texture
achieved, and allowed to dry, I sealed it with a coat of MLC Vinyl sealer.
The next step was to apply a weak gold glaze with, again, an upholstery
foam applicator, blotting the glaze off with a dry section of sponge to keep
the gold very soft and randomly mottled. A coat of sealer and two coats
of CAB lacquer completed the job.
The customers and the designer were (thankfully) very happy with the
result. Hope this gives somebody some useful ideas. I hadn't seen the
technique used before, and sort of deduced it from looking at the finish
I was trying to match.
Michael R
KC
