Stickley Bros. Co - finish

[Ed Clarke]

It looks like my dining room table and china hutch were made by Stickley. This is is "impressed" into the back of the hutch:

Stickley Bros. Co Grand Rapids

I haven't found the impression on the table (yet). Which brings me to my question - what did they use for stain and finish for their tables? The wood looks like quarter-sawn oak with a dark stain. Am I correct in my assumption that the wood is fumed and has shelac for a finish?

I need to make four linear feet of table leaf inserts, each four foot long. Some ABSOLUTE IDIOT THREW THE EXISTING LEAVES OUT because they'd "never need an eight foot table". Misbegotten damn sheep abusers...

[Swingman]

After all, its only wood. :(

Couple of good books around on Stickley stuff, both Gustav and his brothers.One of the best is "The Furniture of Gustav Stickley" by Bavaro and Mossman ... this one contains some notes by Stickley himself on finishing. He was definitely not a fan of highly figured contrast in woods and tried to "tone down" the contrast according to his own words ... one of the reasons he liked fuming on oak and chestnut. One of his finishes, after fuming, called for "1/3 white shellac and 2/3rd's German Lacquer".

There are many more qualified to speak on this matter .. if you can get Andy Dingley's attention in the UK, he can probably get you started in the right direction as well as anyone.

In any event, you might try the Bavaro and Mossman book ... it's well worth the purchase for the history, techniques and plans.

[Andy Dingley]

Shout really loudly ? 8-)

Sorry, but I can't help much here. There were two Stickleys, Gustav and the brothers. Leopold's firm carried on in production for much longer, and is the core of the "Stickley" name in production today.

Gustav experimented and wrote more about their techniques. However he's entirely pre WW1, so the technical materials that were available to him were limited. The other Stickleys continued for longer and so they had the opportunity to use post-shellac finishing products and lacquers. Without knowing the date of the piece, and without knowing a lot more about their finishing history than I do, I couldn't say how your particular piece was done.

There's also the issue with ammonia fuming on oak that it's very sensitive to the timber. I always try to make pieces from the same log, because I just can't match colours otherwise. My own finishing is ammonia, oil, shellac - I don't use dyes or stains.

Seconded.

Some other good books are Gustav's own, especially the catalogues. A lot of these are reprinted quite cheaply by Dover Press. Old copies of "The Craftsman" are worth picking up too.

[Ed Clarke]

I stuck some (crude) pictures up on my web site:

the two pieces. The thing about them is that they don't look like "craftsman" pieces. The glass in the hutch is a single piece, not cut into little six inch panels as most of the craftsman style (that I've seen) is. The legs look "funny" too. More gothic than craftsman.

The table-top looks like quarter-sawn oak, right?