Old Steamer Trunk After Complete Restoration

This old trunk came to us partially dis-assembled by it's good intentioned owner. They had wanted to fix it up themselves, but realized it was way to big of a project for them.  It still had a little bit of the green painted canvas and a few strips of metal left on the box, but other then that, it was in pieces.  They had been able to salvage almost all of the original hardware. The tin strips were rusted so they would need some work, but the cast brass edge and corner pieces were still looking gorgeous. We treated all the tin sheeting that went on the trunk with a rust arrestor. This would keep any rust damage from spreading. All the tin was then painted a shiny black.  All of the wooden slats that decorate the trunk had been marked for us so that we would know where they went once the trunk was re-assembled. This was a big help, and saved us from needing to solve many puzzles. We re-glued any cracks and breaks. Then the slats were stripped, sanded and given a beautiful new water based finish.

We also applied a new canvas cover over the box and painted it a green, very similar to the original green color.  We then put the shiny black tin strips on,  and all the renewed wooden slats.  The brass hardware looks amazing now on this trunk. We don't often get to restore a trunk from it's base, we usually try and make it look as good as possible, without taking the entire thing apart.  We are so please with how this trunk turned out though, that hopefully we will get to do more trunks in such a thorough way!

An 1870's Steamer Trunk comes out clean

 I have blogged about this trunk previously, to talk about it's age and such, but we just did some work on it and I am pretty impressed.    The owner of this trunk already had a good thing going, because there really isn't much structurally that needs to be repaired.  The leather handles and pull are shot and the locking mechanism is damaged.  The leather that once covered the outside was removed and we still need to make a new lid-stay to keep the lid up.

But the biggest thing that this trunk needed was a cosmetic face lift, which we made major steps to accomplishing recently.  After the old leather covering was pulled off we put the trunk through our cleaning tanks.  Not the stripping tanks mind you,  just the two cleaning tanks.  The wood came out so clean that all of us here at the shop have marveled at it,  it almost looks like new wood!   We have also treated it with 'Rust-Stop' which gives the metal a bluish-black look.  I like the look, but it is up to the customer to decide the final treatment of the metal, and of course the rest of the trunk.


Do you have an old trunk hiding away somewhere?  Bring it to us!  Let us make it beautiful for you again.

Clues to your Antique Trunk's Age

Trunk #1

 We have 6 trunks in our shop right now, possibly a record for us.  We love working on trunks though so this is fun for us.  One of them has been completely taken apart so had I taken pictures of it, you would have just seen a plain wood  box and a pile of parts.  So I left it out this time.

Trunk #2

 With so many trunks in our shop, I thought it would be interesting to see if I could find out some history about each one.  So I have been flipping through my 'history  books' and investigating hardware and tin, end caps, etc.

Trunk #3

Trunks 1-3 are very similar, displaying the same style of design and hardware.  They are all most likely made between 1870 and 1885.  Trunk #1 and Trunk #3 have the same clasps on the front, with Trunk #2 only having a very slight variation.  Trunk #2 seems, by it's hardware to be just a little newer than the other to.  But probably only by a few years.  You can see the clasps below...

Trunk #1                     Trunk #2                    Trunk #3

While their clasps are so similar,  the handles are all completely different!

 Again, Trunk #1 and Trunk #3, while having different hardware this time, have the same style of handle, called an 'Anchor Style'.  Since the leather is gone in #3 it is hard to tell, but try and imagine the same shape of  leather as #1, fitting into that fancy hardware.  Trunk #2 has a 'Slotted Style' handle with an end cap that holds the handle onto the trunk.  Another small hint that this trunk is just a few years newer that the other two.

Trunk #4

Trunks #4 and #5 are very different than the other 3.  Trunk #4 has a metal covering over the wood.  The metal is embossed with an alligator skin print, has a curved top, and wooden slats.  The metal covering, pared with the hardware give us very good clues to when this trunk was made.  The handles are in a style called 'Plain Style w/ End Cap' which is different from any of the other trunks we have in right now.  So as to the era, we have seen pictures of trunks with this exact same hardware, and embossed metal, which were built in 1890.  So this trunk is very old, but still a bit newer then those shown above. 

Trunk #5

 Finally, Trunk #5.  This one came to us already restored, but just needing a new lock and handles.  This one looks almost new!  It was restored probably about 50 years ago and given an interesting camouflage(ish) paint job.   To try and figure out the age of a trunk, you can look at many factors, the most enlightening being  the material it was made out of,  it's shape and size,  and the hardware used.  This trunk displays hardware and styling of a trunk made between 1900 and 1925, but because of it's large size, it most likely dates during the earlier part of that era.

So tell me, have you learned anything new by reading this?   I would love to help you discover more about the treasures you have hiding away at home.  Bring them in to us! Give us a challenge!