A Refurbished Ladies Chair

This intricate crest belongs to a dainty little ladies chair. It is so small that by our standards we would think of it as a youth's chair.  But then people are a lot bigger now then they used to be!  Now it is just the right size for an occasional bedroom chair  or for sitting in when you are putting your shoes on.  

The chair came to us with broken cane on the back.  Enough was broken that we really couldn't repair it, we needed to completely replace it.  It was woven with a 'blind cane' method, so the holes that the cane goes into don't go all the way through to the back.  This is much more challenging then regular hand cane.  Once the cane work was done, the 'blonde' looking natural cane needed to be colored to better blend in with the chair.

We also refurbished the chair.  This means that we refreshed the existing finish rather then applying a new one.  Depending on the method used, refurbishing isn't always a job that requires high levels of skill, but it does require high levels of labor.  For this chair we chose a wax color that would fill in where the old finish color had worn off.  This wax is applied by hand, left to dry, and then polished by hand.  This polishing process is quite labor intensive and not for the weak of elbow.  And in addition, this chair has so many little nooks and crannies that the polishing task was bumped up several notches in difficulty.  No one wants a glob of wax stuck in one of those pretty carved leaves!

Weaving Samples for Inspiration

We have a fun project we are working on for our office that I want to share with you.  Very soon, when you come into our office, you will see a beautiful display of cane samples hanging on our walls.   Most people only are familiar with one  cane pattern, generally known as '6 strand'.  We wanted to give our customers a better idea of the variety of weaves available, in case the inspiration would give them an idea about a different look for their chair.  We have 8 completed samples so far and saveral more beatiful designs on the way.  In these photos you can see a ‘4 Strand’ weave, ‘Victoria’, ‘Double Victoria’, ‘Star Of David’, ‘Daisies’, ‘Double Daisies’, and ‘Daisy and Buttons’.  These are just a few weaving examples, there are som any out there to choose from.  We can also weave colored strands into the design, and weave in beautiful center medallions.  I will post photos of those for you later. 

We would love for you to bring us your chair, and work with us to find a beautiful, different, decorative weave, that will set your chair apart from the rest.

Hand Woven Radio Weave

In my last post, I told you about the challenges we had with a radio weave/box weave on a machine caned chair.  Interestingly enough,  we are doing another radio weave/box weave, in the same week!  It is not a particularly common pattern, so this is pretty neat.  Of course, it couldn't be just an ordinary box weave,  it is a box weave on a rattan frame, instead of a normal caned seat frame which has holes drilled into it to weave the fibers through.

This means that each strand has to be wrapped around the frame and twisted around a tiny hidden nail to secure it in place.  And the strands at the top  have to be threaded between the two rattan poles and then wrapped around the nail which is even more tricky.  

One of the things that makes hand caning so interesting and special is that instead of a perfectly even weave, where each hole is almost the exact same dimensions (as it would be with machine caning),  with a hand weave there is some variegation to the pattern.  This give each individual chair it's own special look.