Folk Wood Finishes for Timber ANTIQUE FURNITURE or NEW!

There are so many skills and alternative finishes in this wonderful publication!

Here is your chance to add beauty and value to a tired older piece, or perhaps to create a new, individual piece.

Picture 2 shows the final steps to one such process.

Presented in user-friendly, step-by-step form for each skill.

Throughout the eighteenth century and past the middle of the
nineteenth, the practice of imitative painting
techniques, including graining, marbleizing, and fantasy
finishes, was widespread-initially, among the colonists,
and later, among the citizens of the young nation.
Inasmuch as the fine Toods and marble used by city
cabinetmakers were too expensive for the majority, the methods
of faux painting that are discussed and illustrated
in this book offered an economical means of visually
transforming such modest materials as pine and maple to
simulate the mahogany, rosewood, and marble that were used
in high-style furniture.

Because there were no schools in early America where one might
learn the techniques of graining and
marbleizing, and because there were few apprenticeships
with the cabinetmakers of the time, each craftsman had
to rely on his own resourcefulness and imagination to
discover the paints, tools, and techniques necessary to create
the visual transformations.

These craft experiments resulted
in broad and wonderful variations on and
representations of wood grains and the splendor of marble.

Brushes and paints were often homemade, and the painted
finishes were as varied as the minds and hands of their creators.
In the late-twentieth century, with the renewed and growing
interest in decorative painted surfaces, we have
access to abundant information about and approaches to the
creation of faux finishes.

Once again we are interested
in finding economical ways to achieve stylish visual effects.

And what should be of chief interest to those who use
this book is not t-e pursue a slavish imitation of the effects
illustrated, but rather-once having learned and used
the basic techniques and tools described here-to realize
and value the fact that imagination, experimentation,
spontaaeity, and the freedom of creativity are probably
the most important values to be found in any artistic
pursuit. Have faith in yourself and in your own inherent
aesthetic abilities, and the information contained in this
volume will help clarify your creative vision.

Illustrated with 197 color photographs, including a gallery
of antique painted decoration

RUBENS TELES, the former director of the Jay Johnson Gallery
in New York City, is a native of Brazil. He is on the
faculties of the Folk Art Institute of the Museum of
American Folk Art, New York City, and the Marymount
Manhattan College, New York, as well as teaching
privately at his home in suburban New York.

JAMES ADAMS, the former Director of the Germans Van Eck Gallery
in New York City, is a native of New York.
He holds degrees in Art History, Biology, and Environmental
Studies from Trinity College and Yale University.
Mr. Teles and Mr. Adams cofounded Teles and Adams Design in 1992.
They specialize in design solutions, utilizing
their combined expertise in custom-painted surfaces for
projects commissioned by interior designers, architects,
corporate clients, and private individuals.

In EC..