>Last week my wife and I saw a 18th century French farm table in an antique shop.It was sale priced at$1850 and after no disscussion I offered to make a smaller version for her upcoming birthday.I dug around and came up with some old cherry and chestnut which will do nicely.The original apparently had no finish or an oil finish(no sign of paint),todays finish is wax.I decided to do an oil finish with a satin poly or some thing similar.Wife says the original was waxed and she wants either wax or at most an oil/wax finish.She has a point that it over 200 years old,well used and in good shape.She is aware of the draw backs of this type of finish in a kitchen so I am thinking about doing the oil/ wax.Question is does anyone have a better alternative that would be more resistant to water etc and still have that look?
>This is obviously my very personal opinion but I think you'll never get that gracefully aged patina if you spread polyurethane, satin or otherwise, all over cherry and chestnut. Some of the most beautiful surfaces I've seen were waxed, used, spilled upon, rewaxed for generations. I've got one table with a walnut top, stained, sunbleached, beeswaxed, which has a mellow glow I wouldn't trade for polyanything.
Sutherland Welles (sutherlandwelles.com) makes a product line you should probably look at, though, which offers a really beautiful look that's less strident than most attempts at aged effects, with sufficient protection for dining tables. These stains, although I hesitate to call them that, are amazing. They're more like toned aging penetrants than stains, somehow. You can get information directly from S.W. that will give you a far better idea how they look and work, but Garrett Wade, a dealer, has small online swatches that hint at how these look. My workbench has a walnut base finished in S.W. Polymerized Tung Oil* and it's superb looking (no stain, though). I used the sealant followed by the low lustre, and it's just about the prettiest wood I've ever finished. Don't get me wrong, I use other finishes; just love Tried & True products, French polish whenever it's appropriate, and so on, but I think this is what you're looking for. Mind you, this is one of the most expensive finishes made, but it's been worth every penny each time I've used it.
You might want to consider a good, hard, colored wax over shellac. A thin wash coat of shellac--perhaps a one pound cut, or less--followed by a few coats of a two pound cut, will provide a measure of protection, though not as good as varnish, that's much better than wax alone. (I too would not take polyanything anywhere near your table.)
As I'm sure you know, shellac comes in a variety of warm colors. A "button" shellac looks great and approximates the original finish of many antiques; an orange shellac looks spiffy on cherry.
Wax over shellac is one of my very favorite finishes.
>If you don't need the more permenent (and more expensive) finish I posted and don't mind maintaining the shellac and wax (since you're building it for your own home, anyway, and not a client), it's a really good option. The table will age gradually and it truly is easy to get a nice finish. I do this all the time on my own furniture, often just cleaning away any problems (such as pronounced rings or liquor spills) with alcohol and starting over. What's more, you could even try the S.W. aging stain under the shellac (of course, test on scrap, please).
I'll add that I like using low-lustre waxes, and prefer just plain beeswax rubbed out hard over the shellac with only water - no organic solvents. This used to be a lot easier before I ruptured my rotator cuff. It leaves a 'dry' sheen that I particularly like. This and scrub planing are probably two of the best ways for woodworkers to get that 'starter' heart attack, though.
>Thanks everyone for the input.I've decided to go with the W-S products since it will probably do the job with the least amount of repair in the future.I'll post some "pics" when the project is finished.
