Restorations are something that we occasionally undertake.  It is not our area of expertise and as such, we are a bit selective in the type of pieces we accept for restoration.

When we do restoration work, it is normally a full restoration and not just a partial repair.  Full restoration is expensive and very time consuming, so the prices for this are generally quite high.  It is also very hard to determine what the cost of the restoration would be, so this is done on an estimate only basis.

All that said, we have and continue to repair  unique pieces and pieces from Artists like Napoleon Abueva of which we have done many.

An example of the type of restoration we do is this easel made in Madrid, Spain, circa 1955. It was something that caught George's eye when he was asked about restoring it.  It belonged to and was the main working  easel of Lee Aguinaldo (Philippine Artist) and has too much history to be allowed to decay any further.  A lot of the timber has been destroyed by borers and needs to be replaced along with other broken and missing components.

It is difficult to match timbers that come from Spain with local recycled timbers that we use but it can be done.

Lee's wife Melba was happy to leave all the decisions about the restoration to George Coles our designer and master craftsman.

This table top is a very old Rustic Style.  The owners did not want to hide the imperfections in the top and in fact were happy to keep them.  What we did was to repair all the splits that were affecting the structural integrity of the table and then re-coat it.  Notice the other features that now seem to pop out of the top.  The previous finish was a varnish.  We removed that and use our own oil based finish, which tends to bring the colors out more.  Also an oil based finish is easier to repair if it gets damaged.

This table top is a slab of Kamagong. Sadly, it was cut through the center of the tree and contains the heart wood of the tree.  Heart Wood always shrinks and expands at a different rate then the outer part of the tree.  This being the case, the center section of the table will always show signs of checking (Splitting)  After this checking occurs, the best way to remedy it is to put in the insets that are fixed on either side of the checks.  Normally this is done with what are called butterflies or dovetails, see below, but I now like to use fish as they are more distinctive and perform the same function. Looking at this top, it may seem a large amount of fish to use, but as it is Heart wood and Kamagong, there are a lot of small checks that will continue to open larger if not stabilized.  If it was not heart wood, we could have used far less fish.

Note: The use of the marine epoxy and stain that was used to hide this problem originally on the table top does not work well in the longer term and that is why the owner eventually came to Jarrah Works Fine Furniture for a solution.

This is the traditional method that is used to repair checks (splitting in timber).  They are called Butterflies as that is what they resemble most.  It looks good as a feature and sometimes the checks are left open to enhance the look of the piece.  This of course depends on the piece and the owners preferences.

These panels were carved by Napoleon Abueva for his brother Pepe.  They represent many of the places that Pepe taught as a Professor around the world.  Several panels had checks and all were in need of refinishing.  Afterwards, we mounted them on a large framed Narra panel which we fixed to the wall.  Now visitors walk past the "Travels of Pepe and Corinne" when they enter the home.