Antique Sewing Machine...a new life!

A few years ago, before children, I would visit garage sales. My husband and I went to one that was an estate sale. We were able to walk through the home and check out the whole space! Pretty cool. Since having kids, I have been to 0. That's going to change now!

My mom suggested I give Kyle, my oldest a dollar and then he too could have fun shopping.  We ended up scoring 2 antique sewing table bases that had been redone to have butcher block tops. One was really pretty and round. This is the one featured here.  I knew I didn't like the pale color of the butcher block but didn't want to lose the wood character.  Around the same time, I was doing a custom stenciled ceiling for a client's master bedroom. The stencil was miraculously the same size of my table! Let the painting begin!

Unfortunately I do not have the preview photos. Just imagine it pale wood color. First, I lightly sanded down the poly, then applied a dark gel stain. Then I stenciled my pattern in a dark brown stain. Next, I applied an antique crackle system. It allows just the cracks to be filled with glaze. A few layers of varnish and it's one of my favorite pieces in my home. I set it up for the fall season, hopefully the kids keep their hands off!

The ceiling pattern where the stencil originated.

 

The crackle

Our fall display. 


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Miss Mustard Seed

Why I love my job

I have to say that I feel blessed to do what I love.  I know a lot of people who just go to work day in and out and hate their job. My husband is one of them.  What I love the most, is that it constantly changes and challenges me.  Very rarely am I in the same location for more than 2 weeks. I am usually contracted for a job and most projects are 3-4 days, and sometimes 2 weeks. I did work in a fabulous home in LLoyd Neck, and we painted there for over a year and a half, but not consecutively.  I enjoy traveling to new places for work. HOWEVER, going into Manhattan is never easy.  This past week, I had the pleasure of being called in to mix some paint for some ceiling work at the New York Athletic Club on Central Park South.

I had no idea what I was in for, and brought my bag of tricks. Tints, glaze, brushes and some paint. I showed up at the main desk, fully knowing they would send me around the back to the service entrance, but I didn't know where it was.  My normal attire for work is black pants covered in paint from wiping my hands, and usually a black t shirt.  Today, for whatever reason, I decided to wear khaki shorts, and a navy tank top. Well, there is a dress code at the club, and I didn't fit it!

Here is the link to their dress code: New York Athletic Club Dress Code.  I just went onto their website and found what I should've been wearing..however, I am just the artist and not a member.  The kind gentlemen actually allowed me to walk through the building to the "correct" side and through the service elevator.  I rode up to the 11th floor and walked into the ballroom. WOW.

The contractor failed to tell me the scope of the project and I immediately thought, this is a month long project at least.  The ceiling is amazing, and covered with hand painting, paneling, decorative trim and boxes. When he showed up, he casually mentioned they have to be done by friday, and am I available tomorrow as well, with panic in his voice during the second request.  Unfortunately another client was waiting for me, and I did my best to mix some colors.

Ok, so here is the issues. The center panels where the hand painting is, are all on canvas. The building was built in the late 1800's, and I am not sure how old the work is in this room, but its been touched by other people many times. The guys here were fixing the plaster cracks, and then trying to retouch the paint. As you can see in the picture, there are multiple colors by the panel, all the flat areas should look like that yellow color with glaze over it. However, the areas where someone else repainted are only really obvious when you stare at the ceiling and hunt it down. But when you are trying to make a color, its impossible, because each area is different looking. I really felt so overwhelmed and disappointed. Overwhelmed because I knew this was not a job where I can mix one color for the whole ceiling, it just isn't going to work. Disappointed because this clearly wasn't going to get the loving care it desperately needed.

This isn't my job, so I have no idea what the contract was and for what. I actually had to just put black on this one area, where the rest of the octagon has a red banner type pattern running through it. It looks awful.

Look at how beautiful this is, this is just one small part, and it is begging for a good cleaning.

The ceiling is just monstrous. It needs so much help!

Getting back to why I love my job, there is no way I would have been allowed into this building to see the gorgeous ceilings. I don't know any members, so that wouldn't be my ticket in. A piece of NY history, closed off to the general public, and I was able to see it up close.

Here are a few more pictures, and more hand painting. The next pictures are of the 9th floor, where the ceiling is all wood carving and hand painted sports figures, equipment and scenery.

Who knows, maybe they will decide to restore the ceiling properly and maybe I will get called back to help out.

A painted rug design

I have a wonderful client who decided to add a painted design to the already sealed floor.  The contractor had the floor guy return to buff the floor out for me.  The design changed from a solid painted rug design to an open diamond pattern with a big scroll border, and hand painted square accents.

This was really going to test my mathematical skills. The plan was to have an even amount of squares end on both sides of the rug. Too bad our shape was not a square, so therefore the squares could only end evenly on one side. Oh, and I was given free reign on their size. Hmmm, so how will I even figure this out?  Thank god the adorable contractor had this fantastic calculator that figured it all out for me!!

Hoorah!  Lets begin.  First, we taped off the border, primed, basecoated, and then glazed it.  Then we set about measuring and taping off our diamonds on the inside.  This took longer then expected. We were taping off a 1 inch band, and had to tape both sides.  That then needed to be primed, basecoated, and glazed.  It was then that the client changed the size of the border...it was already painted so we had to improvise and cut off part of our inside dimension, but add on to the outside of the border.  No problemo.


Next we laid out our scroll stencil border and began the tedious process that allows for no mistakes, and makes it easy at the same time.  Its a masking stencil, and you have to order it the size you need, so not a whole lot of room for error.  Once it was laid out, we began layering the colors, then highlighting, then shading.

It took a long time, but I think it was well worth the back pain, and the client was very happy.  That's all that really matters.