The Breakfast Room Chairs

A long time ago when we bought our dining room table it came with four chairs

Duncan Phyfe Chairs

Mahogany Duncan Phyfe Chairs

There are a lot of those mahogany Duncan Phyfe chairs out there.

At any flea market, antique mall or even an antique shop, you'll often find an orphan

if not two or three

For they were made for a long, long time

From the 20s into the 60s

Although I think the earlier chairs were better made

And Linderhof's chairs were earlier chairs

However, there were only four and so at an auction I found shield back chairs

eight of them and they replaced the Duncan Phyfes.

We put them away, getting them out when we had more than eight guests

(Thanksgiving and Christmas)

And then in 2007, we built the breakfast room

We needed to furnish the breakfast room

And bought a baker's rack

(which was replaced with an 1870's ebonized sideboard)

A square table

(which was replaced with an oval Mahogany English one)

and used the Duncan Phyfe chairs.

Husband Jim wanted to paint them.

I told him "no" but he was persistent

And so the Duncan Phyfes got painted.

(I really abhor painting "good" wood).

But it is now 2016

Nine years after we painted the chairs . . . 

And they looked a bit sad!

The paint was peeling

 Especially on the back where belts and backs would rub!

Then I was mad at myself for letting Jim paint them.

But what was done was done.

Jim insisted that we refresh the finish on the dining room chairs

With Restore-A-Finish

A great product to take off grime and refresh (restore) the original luster of wood

Which made me more determined that now was the time to do something

about the breakfast room chairs!

After a search on the internet for good strippers, I bought this product

which was highly recommended on several blogs:

Citristrip

And those blogs who recommended it were spot on!

Luckily I found it at our local Mayco Ace Hardware

(thank you Chris -- you rarely let me down)

thus saving a trip out of town

So I took two of the chairs outside

And used the product

It is easy to use, works in 30 minutes and the paint just comes right off

(In our early marriage days we stripped many pieces of furniture . . . it was a pain

and took "forever"!   It is amazing what 30 years of product development has produced!)

And the chair, stripped and wiped down with Mineral Oil

Then I stained with Ace Hardware Mahogany Stain

Chair on the left, stripped and unstained.    The chair on the right has been stained

After they dried, I brought them in and put the seat back into place.

The chair on the left is the painted chair

The chair on the right is the stained chair.

I am so glad we did this little project

The chairs look so much better in stained wood than they did in black paint

(Even un chipped black paint!)

But then, I'm a wood person

And I should have never listened to my better half!

The chairs, however, are back to the way they were.

And I'm one happy lady!