Refinish Furniture

Teak care and refinishing, black feet on patio furniture, paper wicker, extension dining table.

 Do It Yourself

Take a look below to find out about teak care and refinishing materials.

If your wicker or wood patio furniture has black feet or the lower portion of the legs it could be from too much moisture, see below how to fix the problem.

Paper wicker can be a problem when it starts to look bad, but it can be repainted.

Sticking slides on an extension dining table can be anywhere from a nuisance to a disaster when you give a little too hard of a pull after you decide you need more space on the table while part of dinner is already on the table.

Take a look below to see how to remedy these situations.

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Teak care and refinishing

We have a teak furniture care products section and a teak furniture refinishing products section of our on-line catalog.

One of the benefits of teak is that it's classy enough to use inside and durable enough to use outside.

Our On-line picture catalog of furniture refinishing and care products, wicker and caning material, picture framing material and lots more stuff for your projects is expanding continuously, hopefully we'll hit on some of those unusual items that can't be found anywhere locally, as well as the mundane everyday things that are so much easier to buy on-line.

Black feet on patio furniture

If the feet or lower legs of your wood patio furniture has turned black from sitting in water, from too much rain or from watering the lawn and having standing water on your patio, you can quite often bleach out the black with a 10% bleach solution.

Mix 1 part of household bleach to 9 parts of water in a spray bottle and spray the black parts. You can mix the bleach solution in a bowl and brush it on too.

After you let the legs dry you can seal them with something like tung oil or another clear sealing product from our web catalog page Clear finishes and if they're painted you can repaint after the sealer dries. If the rest of the piece is ok you can just paint up the same distance on each leg and paint a trim line of a complementing color so you don't need to paint the whole piece.

Paper Wicker

email question. . . . .

I have three pieces of "wicker" furniture . My guess is that they are about 1930s. But it appears to be made from paper that is tightly twisted. At present it is painted white and sorely in need of a paint job. The pieces have a number of coats of paint on them. Where it has chipped off I can see the "paper wicker" and that the original color was natural with some detail woven in black. There are cushions on each made with interior springs. They also are in need of repair. The three pieces consist of a couch, a rocker and a chair, all matching. The coats of paint on all three are all very badly chipped and probably need to be stripped.

My questions are ....can this type of "paper wicker" be stripped and repainted in the same manner as real wicker. Can you date it.....can you give me anyother suggestons? I look forward to hearing from you.

Thanks.

Peter

reply. . . . .

Hi

Yes no and somewhere in between.

Your furniture is wicker in the true sense of the word, because wicker is the method, rather than the material, but not wicker as wicker is commonly thought of, as being a natural plant material. Most wicker is made from the rattan palm.

Your wicker is apparently made from twisted kraft paper with a wire core. The twisted kraft came into being toward the end of the 1800's and quite a bit of wicker furniture was made with it after the turn of the century into the 1900's.

Twisted kraft paper wicker

I don't think there is much use of twisted kraft paper wicker work any more, but it is common in Danish Modern woven chair seats and stools, as well as other rush applications. The material of that type used to be made mainly from twisted cattail leaves, but kraft paper is cheaper and easier to make. The twisted cattail and some other similar material is known as natural rush and the twisted kraft paper is fiber rush.

You can't strip the paper wicker, because the kraft paper would soak up the stripper and probably turn to mush and would probably disintegrate, but you can repaint it.

I would build up the chipped places with primer paint or if they're large deep chips thin some wood filler and paint several layers into the chips, be sure to let each coat dry thoroughly before applying the next.

After the paper wicker is covered and protected you can proceed with the surface preparation. A light sanding is always required before painting over an already painted surface, but it's totally impossible to sand effectively. Liquid deglosser will take care of pre-painting preparation and cleaning. Apply it with a brush and it will get into all the inaccessible places, then remove the excess and residue with a dry brush. Wipe the brush frequently with a paper towel or rag.

Be sure to keep your used cleaning materials in a Metal waste can to guard against spontaneous combustion.

The easiest way to paint wicker is with spray cans, you can get into all the nooks and crannies easier. Latex spray paint is good as it's flexible and will resist cracking.

You might check with a local antique dealer for an approximate value of your furniture. I would imagine that the paper wicker antiques aren't too plentiful, although they were manufactured prolifically during the first part of the 20th century.

Quick sticking extension dining room table tip

If you have an extension dining room table that is sticking and hard to pull open, check underneath and see what type of extensions it has. If it has metal extensions, extend the the table all the way open and spray the extensions with a silicone spray (be very careful to not get any on the finish).

If the extension is wood extend it all the way and apply bar soap or paraffin wax to all the parts that touch each other and slide.

Slip-It is an excellent product for sliding things from wood table slides to wood drawers.

It's easiest to turn the table upside down, but if you can't turn it you'll have to work with you upside down. Spread newspapers or plastic sheeting on the floor to protect it.

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Glass etch and decoration
Glass etch and decoration 		stained glass
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T-Squares 		Drafting paper
Drafting paper

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