The Ghosts of Furniture Past^TM

This is the story of my Pie Safe Milk Paint Patina Restoration Journey!! It began with an Epic Fail for Me! I have to admit a mistake. I purchased this beautiful antique pie safe several years ago in Georgia. I was thrilled with it, but was not so savvy in paint chemistry or antique value at the time. It was obtained circa 1986 during my yellow and blue French country decor days. This is a long story of woe, rehabilitation and transformation with some amazing images and how-tos. It is another chapter in my Ghosts of Furniture Past career.

I did the unthinkable – I stripped it. HORRORS!!!

I attacked the stripping process vigorously. I could not get all that paint off. It seemed as though it had become one with the wood…and it had. Some prophetic voice of reason in my head stopped me short of stripping one door. I went to the library; yes, this was before the Internet. I read about old paint and concluded that I had committed a terrible lapse in judgment  – I had stripped the pie safe of its original aqua milk paint finish. You can see the result below. Lesson learned – milk paint, done well, does not strip! YIKES!!! So it sat, untouched yet useful for some 28 years in this forlorn state. You can still see remnants of the beautiful milk paint below and the one surviving door.

Antiques Roadshow should have a photo of me in its Hall of Shame. Fast forward to 2014. I have embraced aqua and feel a sense of remorse {insert SHAME} every time I walk past this piece. In addition, I walk past it several times each day. That makes me one sad girl.

Safe Milk Paint Patina Restoration

I went through a multitude of paint chips to find the color. It was not really green, it was not really blue. It had undulations of paint hues. It was not quite flat paint either. What was a girl to do? I finally took the door that I had not stripped to the paint center to have it matched by that very useful computer/scanner device. It came back with greenish tint, so I asked them to add a little more blue. Home again I did several sample boards to work out the technique. I decided to use three colors for the recreation. I could do this. I am a master decorative painter after all. So began the journey to recreation.

First, I/we scrubbed all the surfaces of the pie safe with a multi purpose cleaner. I found that I didn’t need to scrub. I used a cloth on some areas. It removed years of stains that we have added to the wood over the years. I allowed it to dry overnight.

Painting the Pie Safe

I loaded my palette with care. I would be attempting to match the 120+ year-old patina of the one surviving door over the entire piece. To make it work, I would need to be very thoughtful about where and how the paint is placed. I took my usual position n the floor and loaded a brush…

I used artist’s brushes to paint from a three-color palette – the greenish flat latex paint I had color matched to the door, a Golden Paints Phthalo Green (Blue Shade) and Phthalo Blue (Green Shade). Here we go…

The Transformation

Carefully I began with a portion of the pie safe that was the least visible – inside the door I stripped. I would work out the color and the strokes here. I flowed the paint on, dabbed other colors on and wiped it back here and there. It looked so close that neither my son nor HIMself could tell which was the newly painted one and which was the original. Scheeeeewwww. I was feeling empowered now. The two images below show the original door with the new patina finish on sections of the pie safe. Can you tell?

I hit my stride and painted through the afternoon. It was therapeutic for me. I have taken a few steps toward recapturing my old life and career as a master decorative painter. I love to paint – murals, walls, furniture. I stepped away from teaching and painting in 2008. I had a rekindling of that dormant, restless painting spirit in Atlanta (at Haven) when I attended a Modern Masters painting session. I found tears rolling down my cheeks as I remembered all those years of training from French and Italian masters. The years I devoted to the art and craft of decorative painting. The students I have taught. It all came rolling back. This project is validation for me. I belong to this fun furniture-painting world! And I am pretty good at it! 🙂

Above are the finished pieces. However, the left door was a little light when I held them together. It bothered me. I needed to add some darkness around the door to emulate the years of hands that have opened the doors. I pulled out the shading gray airbrush paint. I wiped it on a few strategic areas…et voila! Can you tell which door is original?

Make sure you clear your brushes!!