|
GRASSI CARLO SRL |
 |
|
 |
|||
|
GRASSI CARLO SRL |
|
|
|
|
|||
This traditional wood polishing is quite a bit antique. The fist time it was used was in France around the XVIII Century. From that epoch the pad polish method is always used, more than other techniques. Usually to execute a pad polish method we use an alcoholic shellac a resinous secretion from an insect called “cochineal” living in Indonesia. The proportion to obtain this solution is around 250 grams over 1000 cl of alcohol at 94%. The passage of the resin is slow around 24 hours, after the compound is filtered with a sock to eliminate any impurity.
 |
From left to right: a can of sandarac, shaving shellac with a pad on top, bottle full of shellac solution, bottle of straw-colored oil, a box containing a shaving shellac. |
The polishing method starts with the preparation of the wood. This is wet first with warm water then smoothed down to eliminate any fibre, and to rub down the warty margin. After these operations are done we move to the coloring of the wood (optional) than we move to the oil method, which is needed to give a transparent depth to the polish. We spread over the wood a light layer of straw-colored oil and must remove the excess oil with a dry cloth. After all this work we start with the real polishing method, soaking a shellac with a thin linen fabric and after squeezing we proceed over all the parts to be polished. It is important to cover carefully with circular movements to allowed the shellac to soak on the wood (about 3 times).
At this point we sprinkle some pumice-stone and a drop of straw-colored oil on top of the part to be polished. Then, with a pad (a piece of linen inside a wool flock) we start in a light pressure and in a circular mode to use the pad with more pressure. When the pad starts to dry out, pay attention not to come back on the part already polished. When the wood pore is closed the piece needs to rest for at least 12 hours.
Now the pad must be extended using the same procedure. After 4 times the polishing is reached and we can leave the piece (cal finished by wax) or we can procede to the mirror polishing. This method is different because we use a thin piece of wool soaked in alcohol, covered with two pieces of linen and on the last one we use two drops of straw-colored oil, following the same procedure above.
When the first linen is dried out it must be removed until the other one is dry too. If needed, refill the pad. To allow other use, when the piece is shiny the work is finally done.
