Warped Shingles: If you want to un-warp shingles use a hair dryer. This will flatten out the shingles in no time. Learned from a friend who called Northeastern regarding warping 1/4" dollhouse kits. I also seal the shingles that come in sheets prior to extracting them from the pattern board. I live in Florida. Yes, shingles do have a tendency to warp no matter what glue you use. Mainly the more water in the glue (as in Elmers regular white glue), the more the shingles will warp.

Rhonda in Florida

Floor finishes: What's in the finish is probably both dust and air bubbles. You're supposed to shield the finish as it dries to keep off the dust. And, if you stir varathane vigorously, you get bubbles that won't pop and smooth out like they do in old fashioned varnish or shellac. I finish my floors (and walls and ceilings) outside the room because it works better for me, and I can sand/make a mess without ruining other things I've done (guess how I learned that.) So, it's: stain, sand, (thinned shellac & another coat of stain if necessary, sand), varnish, sand, varnish, sand, sand again with a finer grade (or two or three), steel wool, wax, buff. I've left out a couple of other things I do, too, but then I enjoy this. Basswood is hairy when you sand it raw, and it takes stain unevenly. I'm thinking about 'real' wood for some time when I can afford/find some.

Heather in Toronto

Floor Finishes: I use Deft to finish my wood floors. I use basswood because I like to stain them oak. After the stain is dry I apply Deft by dipping an old soft rag (usually my husband's discarded undershirts) and rubbing it on. Let that dry overnight, steel wool, varnish again, let dry. I then usually rub it down with brown paper sack and then a clean soft cloth (more undershirts) And my husband keeps wondering why I keep replacing his undershirts with new ones so often!

Fannye

Finishing Tips: I make a sanding block. Mine is 1¼"x2½". I wrap it tightly with fine sandpaper and masking tape to hold it. That way when I'm sanding floors or anything flat, the pressure is consistent over the entire piece. This gets into corners and up against walls perfectly.

The Deft varnish that I use is not high gloss. But I buff it so that it will "glow" You can see some reflection of furniture legs, but just enough to make it look rich. And again, I wipe the varnish on with a soft cloth. Again with the old undershirts!

Also for tile floors or marble where you want a really, really high gloss, I have used thin Plexiglas on top of the patterned floor. After the baseboards and trim at the back of the house are on you cannot see the edges and it just looks like high gloss marble or tile.

Fannye in TX

Deft: Deft is basically lacquer. It comes in both spray and brush on, semi-gloss and gloss. I use this extensively in my minis for several reasons:

1) It dries extremely fast 2) If you build up several layers and steel wool the final layer it gives a beautiful rich finish 3) The building up of several layers can somewhat fill small pores in the wood that might show with one layer of traditional varnish.
2) I usually apply about 4 layers - (I use the spray semi gloss most of the time) When the final finish is dry, buff with 0000 steel wool and it gives and incredible deep finish. If you like it glossier, apply a little spray wax and rub in.
3) Caution! Deft is not the finish to use if your item will be exposed to water - it will turn milky if water rings get on it, etc. For minis this is not usually a problem.

Bonnie Gibson

Rubber Finish: To make a non cracking, flexible coat to material try looking at neoprene or liquid latex. Latex is the natural liquid rubber and neoprene isthe man made. Same stuff.

DrBob...Delray Beach, FL

Pewter Finish: It is called Rub n Buff and Michaels and other craft stores carry it. It is a metallic wax and comes in pewter, gold, copper, silver, etc. I made my black Chrysnbon stove silver with it: http://gerdesdesign.com/kitchen.htm

Anne Gerdes

Finishing Cherry: For a non clogging fine finish on cherry I would suggest 0000 grade wire wool and Danish or tung oil. Rub the wood first with the wire wool then apply the oil with a non fluffy cloth. Let it dry overnight and if it's soaked in patches, apply another coat. Again, leave 12 hours. and then buff with a light cloth. You can apply subsequent coats and then polish until you get the desired sheen. One important note, when you've finished with your oily cloth do not leave it lying around as they can suffer spontaneous combustion!

Peter Cook

Floor finishing: I finished my cherry wood floors with Tung Oil. I sanded between applications and put it on about 3 or 4 coats. They look beautiful.

Betty

Floor finishing: I have been using shoe polish on my wood floors. It looks great and there is NO warping. Comes in rich looking brown colors and polishes up to fine gleam.

Jan in Cincinnati

Floor finishing: To finish floors, I sand with many grades of sand paper, ending with 600. Then to stain, I wet sand the stain onto the wood with 600 grade. After dry, I have had good luck with neutral paste shoe polish. Polish several times buffing well between coats. Experiment on a scrap piece of wood to see how if any the paste wax alters the stain color.

Shelby

Countertops: Earlier this year I was asked to make a café countertop, with a marble top. Sooo, to cut down on weight and because I didn't have any marble, I used kids' construction paper. I had some that was black and white and looked like marble. I cut it to size, glued it on, and then the work started LOL. I put on a coat of acrylic varnish (clear), waited till it dried, then sanded. I must have done this at least 25 times. (My son-in-law uses the same method when he paints cars.) When I was done, the top was as smooth as marble and just gleamed. You couldn't tell it was paper.

Lorna Harvey

French Polish: French Polish as talked about in furniture is not what you put on your nails, but a technique for finishing wood. It has a high gloss and is almost perfectly smooth. It involves applying shellac with a cloth pad. It does not leaves imperfections, brush marks or orange peel, and it picks up dust so that does not get in the finish.

The disadvantage of a French Polish is it takes a long time to build any thickness because each application is so thin. Shellac is the only finish that can be successfully applied this way, in my opinion. It is a rather ineffective way to apply a finish with all the other options now available to us, but an excellent way to repair a finish.

French Polish was developed at a time when our wonderful sandpapers were not yet available, and was considered an elegant finish compared to the more common finish of the 17th and 18th centuries of wiping on and off either linseed oil or wax, or to brush on shellac or varnish.

All the above applies to full size furniture. I find that a few coats of tung oil, which comes in both shiny and soft patina finishes, is far easier to do on miniature furniture than French Polish.

Barb Jones

French Polish: French polish is a rubbed on mixture of white shellac and alcohol that is laboriously rubbed on furniture that has been stained. After putting on several coats of this, mix some linseed oil with the shellac and rub on a few coats of that, too. Use fine sandpaper or steel wool to finish it off.

Dottie in Tucson

Finishing Cherry: I use cherry for some of my furniture as I have a virtually unlimited supply of it from the tree in my garden. It's no different to finishing any other wood really.

I use french polish, thinned if necessary and, applied with a brush, rubbed down with 0000 gauge steel wool between coats and finished off with a good quality wax polish. If you want a natural finish just apply one coat of french polish or a shellac base sealer and then wax. For a more polished look about three coats should do. No doubt everyone will tell you something different but this works for me.

Incidentally cherry is a very versatile wood for miniatures. It has a nice close attractive grain and can be stained to represent most other woods, for example oak or mahogany. Cherry stained an oak or mahogany colour will look far more realistic in miniature than real oak or mahogany, the grain of these woods being much too course for miniatures unless it's very carefully selected.

Colin Bird

French Polish Confusion: There seems to be some confusion about french polish. Although French polishing is a process as someone mentioned, here in the UK it is definitely a product as well. I know this as I have a bottle of it upstairs with French Polish written clearly on the label.

Basically French Polish is just a high quality shellac varnish. Thetraditional way of applying it is with a pad but it can also be brushed on, which is the easiest way for miniatures. Other shellac based finishes are Button Polish, Garnet Polish and White Polish. The difference is the colour, Garnet Polish is a dark brown, Button Polish is a lighter brown and White Polish is bleached shellac which can be used as a clear finish. They can all be thinned with meths which I think you call denatured alcohol in the US. If brushed on you need to take the gloss off and remove any brush marks between coa ts. I use 0000 gauge steel wool for this. The final stage is to wax it and then buff it with a soft cloth to give a nice shine. You can also apply the wax with the steel wool. This is the best way I know of giving a quality finish on miniatures and I know several other miniaturists who use this method.

Colin Bird

FRENCH POLISHING miniature furniture. This finish is the best, long lasting and durable. It is also very time consuming. The basic process is to polish oiled wood to a durable finish.

First the wood as finished and smooth as possible before applying any thing to it. I like to carefully scrape the surface with a single edge razor blade until it is absolutely smooth. You must really be careful here as you can leave nicks or scratches. Then follow up with several sandings and finally ending up with a rubbed oil surface.

For smoothing many people like steel wool but I feel it has problems in that it can round off nice crisp edges and it also leaves little (micro) steel splinters in the wood pours which show up in the final finish. Some people like fine sandpapers but they leave micro fine lines if you are not careful. For a really fine finish I find the wet or dry papers best using 600, 1500 and 2500 grits. Wet (dampen not saturate) the wood down near the final sanding then let it dry. This raises the short grains of wood which then can be sanded off when dry using the finest grit or even a paper grocery bag. The wood will almost have a polished look to it if done correctly.

Finally apply a light coat of tung oil or boiled linseed oil. I find gunstock finishing oils really the best. They have driers added which make the process go a lot faster. Let the oil dry for several days if possible then use a piece of old T shirt wrapped around your finger tip and then dampened in the oil. Wipe it off a bit (I use my apron). Now dip the oiled cloth into rotten stone powder and shake off the excess. Then rub it on the surface of the piece, in a circular motion, to remove the surface film of the dried oil. Repeat adding rottenstone until it is completely smooth. What you really want to do is polish the wood. When you have polished it as best as you can apply another light coat of oil on the surface and let dry over night and repeat the rubbing process again with rottenstone. I like to use the same spot of cloth each time as it becomes nice and smooth. Change the cloth when it gets hard and is smooth and glossy. When it reaches this point it can scratch the surface.

When all done finish off with a light polish with a very soft cloth. You do not want a high polish on miniatures ad it looks out of scale. go for a nice satin finish.

Shellac or lacquer are not necessary on French polishing unless You have a fairly porous wood or just want to do a quickie job. If you are using a porous wood such as mahogany or walnut and some cherries to name a few you will probably need a light coat or two of shellac or lacquer at the start.

Don't over do it. It is better to work it slowly with several coats. Let the finish dry thoroughly then sand it as smooth as possible. Look at the surface from the edge or sideways so you can see if the pours are filled. Apply more finish as need to fill the pours. Sand until all pours are filled then use the oil method with rotten stone to finish it. Watch your polishing carefully as lacquer and shellac finishes have a tendency to become very glossy.

This process does not work well on stained woods.

Bill Hudson, Eugene, Oregon

Priming: Regarding shellacing dollhouse kit parts. I use a product that is a "white shellac" that I purchased at the Sherwin Williams store. This is a mixture of shellac and, I think, denatured alcohol. After I study the kit instructions and the sheets, I determine which parts will NOT be painted in the end product and circle them on the sheet with a few dots of acrylic paint (front and back) so that I don't accidentally shellac them.

Once these dots have dried, I coat the entire sheet with the shellac *before* I even begin punching the pieces out.

There are a lot of good products out there now but this is what works for me. It dries really (REALLY!) fast, is extremely thin (no primer build up to contend with) and I can coat all of the sheets at the same time and still be able to remove the pieces as they don't become "painted" together at the die cut edges.

This is a great time saver as all my pieces are ready to work with whenever I have a few moments. I don't have to worry about removing them and then priming them. I just remove them, sand, paint and go.

Reva Losiewicz

Antique Sheen: My husband gave me an old can of Bri-wax to use on a small cabinet that I wanted to look antiqued. I used it with doubts, and was amazed at the beautiful satin finsh I got with this stuff. It took four coats and some rubbing, but the finished result was perfect in scale. All of the aging and depth looked like full sized, that had been shrunk with my magic wand.

Carol Wagner

Gesso: Gesso is a staple of my paint supply. I use it as an underbase, or sanding sealer, for use on any piece of furniture that will be painted, as it is a simple filler and sands easily. Apply it with a good quality sponge brush. Because it is porous it needs to be applied in two to three coats and sanded after each coat dries. When your surface is sanded smooth, (meaning no brush marks, sanding marks, and all trace of wood grain is hidden), you can seal it and start applying your color coat. The surface is smooth enough to make a wood surface look like a metal surface after painting.

Carol Wagner