A Dresser Repair

 I often feel like we are 'all the king's horses and all the king's men' here at the shop, trying to put together furniture pieces which are completely fallen apart.   This isn't quite as bad as some other pieces we have had (see our 'humpty dumpty posts here and here...)  but it was pretty close.  This dresser was in such bad repair, that we couldn't stand it on it's feet, and when we moved it back into our work area, there were even more seams coming loose.  This was a case of significant glue failure, fortunately we are able to do something about that kind of problem.
We had much better success then the 'kings cavalry' in that famed story.  To begin with, we need to take apart any joints or seams that were loose, we wouldn't want to glue one part, only to have another part collapse!  So once all loose seams were dealt with, we went about the task of re-gluing the entire piece with hide glue.  Hide glue is the oldest know glue that is still in use today.  It was found in items that were buried in the pyramids! We used hide glue on this piece because that is what it was originally glued with.  Hide glue can last pretty much forever, as long as it is kept in indoor conditions.  If it is in high heat or high humidity conditions (such as grandma's attic) the glue will fail.