Posted By John Aniano in central NJ

Date Thursday, 6 January 2022, at 10:12 p.m.

John Aniano in central NJ
Hello All,

Wondering if the collective wisdom here might be able to help me. My wife and I recently bought a circa 1943 Lane brand cedar chest in quite nice condition. We want to use it and are wondering if and/or how to renew the cedar odor within the chest. The bottom portion of the chest is solid cedar with a veneered outer surface. Any ideas? Light sanding on the inside cedar surfaces? Are there cedar oil treatments that I can apply to renew the chest? One of the patent numbers branded on the lid describes a shellac sealer on the inner surface to slow the cedar smell from being lost too quickly. Obviously they weren’t thinking eight decades when they wrote that patent idea!

Also, the top has four (4) book matched veneer pieces (over a solid poplar substrate) that appear to be still well glued down and flat but the central joints are a bit frayed looking in terms of the finish shine. I’m guessing that the finish might be a hard lacquer or some sort of hard oil varnish and the shine has been degraded because the veneer shrunk slightly over the intervening decades. The veneer probably shrunk a tiny bit but the hard surface finish just cracked a little in places. Any ideas on adding some finish to these regions? Shellac should stick to just about anything clean - might this be a good idea to fill in these regions at the veneer joints and bring back an even polished surface?

Thanks in advance.

John

 

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