“Before” picture to the right shows a chair having a great heavy, solid, beautifully carved frame yet also an uninspiring globby finish with massive paint failure everywhere. The stuff was peeling off in sheets.
It seemed impossible to believe that this finish might be a genuine valuable old original paint (because such finishes don’t fail like this), and is more probable that it was applied quickly and carelessly. Large flakes were peeling off, yet about 10% of this layer stayed firm, providing flickers of interest underneath the five-layer milk paint sequence of light putties, golden browns and gunmetal blues that I applied (and then scrubbed off).
The finished product is a multi colored and multi layered heavily distressed painted finish that looks antique. I can’t say enough good things about milk paint – it is beautiful, workable, self-priming, astonishingly durable, has a lovely texture, and really anchored those little patches of previous paint layers down. This chair will look smashing in its new upholstery of pewter colored silk. Inspiration for the finish texture came from a picture in the latest Decor magazine of a very heavily distressed old upholstered side chair. As for the color, it had to blend with a large painting in the room where it was going to live. As usual I mix up my own paint, and the designer made visits to the studio to see the chair in progress and give feedback.
