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Friday, May 14, 2010

Bespoke Iron Garden Furniture

What exactly do we mean by bespoke iron garden furniture. If you are from England, India or any other former British colony, I�m sure you already know. But if you are English speaking from the Americas or Australia, you probably do not what bespoke means. The word bespoke is British for custom designed or commissioned work. So, bespoke iron garden furniture is custom designed iron garden furniture.

Wrought iron means 'worked iron' and wrought iron is the product of a blacksmith's hard work. Heating the raw metal bars until they reach a malleable temperature and then hammering the white-hot iron on an anvil or forge is the traditional method of producing it. This process makes the iron flexible so that it can take on graceful curves. Heating to such a high temperature removes the carbon and other impurities from the raw metal. Removing impurities makes the iron much stronger so it will last longer.

Since it is so labor intensive and require kiln that can reach and sustain high temperatures, creating bespoke iron garden furniture is a relatively expensive process. While true wrought iron ornaments are available, it is rare for large items of garden furniture to be wrought in this manner.

The word iron comes from the Scandinavian word iarn and has been used since prehistoric times. Because it is harder than bronze, iron was an extremely valuable material. The Iron Age came after the Bronze Age. Blacksmiths still work in the ancient tradition, though most of them now use mild hot or cold rolled steel to build their bespoke iron garden furniture.

Since both iron and steel are subject to rusting, after it has been made into the desired object, the metal must next be polished to perfect smoothness. Sometimes, the metal is put in a chemical bath to remove any oil that may have gotten on it. Then it is primed with a rust inhibiting primer. Finally is it painted, usually flat black. However, I have seen several garden benches and a few fences that were a very attractive deep hunter green.

Bespoke iron garden furniture gates and fence post are frequently toped with ornate scrollwork or the traditional points and most benches have wooden slates added to the seats and backs for comfort.

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Wednesday, May 12, 2010

Saw Marks On The Back Of Antique Furniture

Saw marks on the back of antique furniture are a common thing. In fact, they are useful in providing one of the easiest methods for actually dating the antique furniture piece. Although the circular saw was invented around 1800, the circular saw did not come into wide spread usage until after 1830. Therefore, boards that exhibit circular saw marks were most likely cut after 1830.

Prior to that time ripsaws were used to cut boards and frequently the antique furniture built prior to 1830 will display small almost parallel saw marks on the back headboards, cabinet backs, drawer bottoms and other of unfinished areas of the piece.

Prior to the mid 19th century, all lumber was worked by hand. The logs were cut in the proper lengths by axe or hand-sawing. Next the logs were cut lengthwise in two or more board strips usually with a two-man hand ripsaw. Then the cabinet makers dressed their boards with a jack plane and draw knives. As a result of this hand tooling, many unfinished non-visible surfaces like backboards and drawer bottoms will show evidence of "hand-planing" which means that there will be subtle undulating rows in the wood because it is almost impossible even for a master craftsman to get a uniformly smooth flat surface working with hand tools.

Obviously saw marks on the back of antique furniture are an important piece in determining the age of the antique furniture. But they are not the only indication of age. Other construction methods also provide fairly accurate dating.

Wooden dowels can reveal the approximate time of construction. This is important in pieces that have no unfinished surface such as dining room chairs. You can use wood dowels as another helpful method for authenticating a piece of furniture�s age. Machine dowel pins will be perfectly circular and fit flush to the surface of the piece. Hand made dowel pins are non-round and will protrude slightly from the surface of the pieces because of shrinkage over time in the wood they are securing and swelling in the dowel as well.

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Wednesday, February 10, 2010

Bedroom Furniture On Lay Away

A time honored tradition among the working class is to put bedroom furniture on lay away. Lay away id the poor man�s financing arrangement. No credit needed. No risk to the retailer or the buyer as long as it is a reputable store. Just purchase a product, make a down payment and the store puts the item in a store room. Then every payday, the buyer makes payments until the item is paid off. Then the customer gets to take it home.

Even today, lay away is still available in many of the working class neighborhoods in the United States.

When selecting bedroom furniture on lay away, it is important to choose a style that will fit the room. Small-scale, low profile bedroom furniture with few pieces that is placed in a large, high-ceilinged room will dwarf the furniture and lessen the overall design effect. In contrast, a large set with many pieces will overpower a small room and make it hard to move around the bedroom furniture. The number of pieces that can be comfortably placed in a bedroom is just as important a consideration as the bedroom furniture design.

When buying bedroom furniture on lay away, measure the room it will be going in. Don�t just measure the room size, but also the distance between windows and doors and the outer walls. Then sketch a layout of where you would like to put the pieces.

The bed is the focal point of the bedroom so you need to decide where you want to out the bed. Find the best wall to place your bed and then place additional bedroom furniture around the bed. Now, open all of the doors near the bed to see how much room is left when they are open. Write those measurements down on your sketch.

A king size bed is 84 inches wide. A queen size is 64 inches wide. Standard beds are either 80 or 84 inches long. Most headboard and footboards are 4-6 inches thick. I like to mark out the boundaries of the bed to make it easier to decide where to put everything else. The rule of thumb is to leave three feet on either side of the bed and at the bottom clear. Next measure the space that is left and write it down on your sketch.

Take your sketch and a tape measure to the furniture store (or to the website if you are shopping online). When you find the bedroom furniture on lay away you want, start measuring each piece to see if and where it will fit in the room.

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Monday, February 8, 2010

Rustic Mexican Furniture Wholesale

If you like the casual elegance of Southwestern living you will appreciate the rustic Mexican furniture wholesale from Mexico's highly skilled craftsmen who follow the traditions of their ancestors when they manufacturers each piece of rustic furniture. Each unique piece has been modeled on the original Spanish colonial designs of the 16th and 17th centuries. The furniture is created from solid, kiln-dried ponderosa pine frequently using genuine wormwood accents. After construction the pieces are hand finished with a rich, honey-colored stain, and a satin polyurethane topcoat to protect the wood from splitting and cracking.

The local craftsmen make living room furniture that is upholstered with down and cover in tanned pigskin. There are elegant dinning room tables and smaller breakfast tables for use in either the kitchen or on the side porch. Hand carved headboards with beautiful hand painted designs that match the handcrafted dressers and armoires can be purchased. You should be able to find pieces for every room in the house in the rustic mexican furniture wholesale style at reasonable prices.

All rustic Mexican furniture wholesale uses iron hardware that is hand-forged and finished using a distressed, oxidized finish. The result is a rustic yet classically Mexican look that will add style and elegance to your home.

Mexico has been considered as the best place to fins fine tin products and exceptional Talavera for centuries. These two beautiful crafts have been combined together to produce beautiful Tin and Talavera Tile Mirrors. Artisans in the peaceful city of San Miguel de Allende create each unique design. Each intricate pattern is carefully punched into the tin by hand. Most of the Talavera Tile mirrors are available in several different sizes in both natural and oxidized tin. Most of the rustic mexican furniture wholesale mirrors can be hung either vertically or horizontally.

Any common type of accessory mirror is the unique hand-painted tin mirrors from the city of Oaxaca. They are great favorites for family and children�s rooms because of the bright colors and whimsical subject matter.

Any of these rustic mexican furniture wholesale pieces will almost certainly become a centerpiece of conversation with first time visitors to you home.

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Tuesday, February 2, 2010

Outdoor Furniture Repair/Rebuild Parts

If you love it and don�t want to throw it away, then you need to find a qualified professional to fix it. Outdoor furniture repair/rebuild parts furniture repair shops are the best source for finding a skilled craftsman to repair and refinishing better quality outdoor furniture.

These shops provide services that include repainting and refinishing for wood, repainting and powder coating for metal frames, replacing worn or broken hardware and replacing worn or stretched out and broken strapping on the seats and chair backs.

Outdoor furniture repair/rebuild parts shops start with sandblasting either the wooden or the metal frame of the outdoor furniture to remove all of the original finish and any rust, mold, mildew or other type of corrosion or rotting that has occurred.

Next for wood they will sand it to a smooth finish and the stain or paint the frame. For metal, they will both prime the metal with an anti-rust primer and then paint it with a good quality latex paint or they will add an application of a powder-coated finish to the clean bare metal.

Powder coating is a state of the art finishing process that is used on all the new patio furniture you see in the major retailers. Powder coating has excellent durability. It is corrosion resistant and provides better ultra violet color stability and is a far superior finish than wet paint finishes. Particles of polyester powder are electro statically charged and applied to the aluminum or steel frame patio furniture. The coated metal frame is then baked on in an oven at 400 degrees to cure the coating.

Outdoor furniture with vinyl strapping or plastic webbing has been popular for pools and patios for over 30 years. Over time, vinyl strapping will fade and become dry and brittle from exposure to the sun, causing the straps to crack and break. Sunlight can cause the vinyl strapping or plastic webbing to fade and that makes your outdoor patio furniture look shabby and unattractive.

Outdoor furniture repair/rebuild parts repair shops can replace the vinyl strapping on your aluminum or steel frame chaise lounges and chairs and can make your pool and patio furniture look like new.

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Monday, February 1, 2010

Outdoor Furniture Distributors

Outdoor furniture distributors are an important and essentially indispensable part of the business supply chain for small and medium sized retail establishments. They import and distribute outdoor furniture from different manufacturing facilities from around the world.
Outdoor furniture distributors usually operate efficient modern warehouse facilities. They typically sell to local hardware stores, garden shops and the smaller retail outdoor furniture outlets. What outdoor furniture distributors do is make it possible for a local merchant to offer products from many different companies located all over the world to their customers.

These outdoor furniture distributors follow the changing trends in furniture manufacturing technology, customer preferences and the general market conditions in the industry. They provide the benefit of their knowledge and experience to the local merchant.
Outdoor furniture distributors can eliminate the expense of carrying a large inventory and reduce the cost of doing business for their clients. Good distributors usually ship orders within 24 hours of receiving orders. The larger ones typically have their warehouses located regionally to minimize the shipping time to their retail outlet customers. Most offer volume pricing programs designed to leverage the retail store�s buying power.

Since many outdoor furniture distributors even offer in-house customizing and repair services to their clients, they can provide the small retailer a distinct advantage over the chain store�s �what you see on the floor is what you buy� typical product selection. Now the small local retailer can off a wide range of special order products that be delivered quickly since they are already sitting in the outdoor furniture distributor�s warehouse ready for shipping.

Without outdoor furniture distributors it would be almost impossible for a small retail outlet to offer these products to their customers. They allow your store to carry a few samples to show prospective customers while guaranteeing prompt delivery when sale is made

The outdoor furniture distributor is a vital link in the retail outlet distribution process. If you operate an small hardware store, garden shop or retail store and want to offer outdoor furniture products to your customers, contact your local library or chamber of commerce to obtain a list of outdoor furniture distributors.

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Friday, January 29, 2010

Irish Bedroom Furniture

When the first Irish settlers came to America they brought all of the traditions and know how needed to create a unique style of furniture referred to as Irish bedroom furniture. This furniture is built using high quality pine wood coupled with an exquisite hand-waxed finish. The bedroom furniture usually consists of pine beds, dressers, wardrobes, chests of drawers, cabinets etc.

Irish master craftsmen go to excessive lengths to ensure that each elegant and durable solid pine products is structurally sound and built for durability. Each individual item is sculpted into practical and stylish pieces that require a minimum of four working days to produce.

Irish bedroom furniture is a timeless simple style of furniture that it carefully constructed country furniture made from various types of pine built by craftsmen using the designs of the past but manufactured with precision and attention to detail. Irish bedroom furniture combines the rustic charm you would expect to find in a country farmhouse with the fine craftsmanship and quality materials you would want to use in your dining room.

Many of those early immigrants saw the potential of the densely forested areas along the east coast of America. The settled in New England and opened case goods manufacturing facilities. Many becdame successful companies whose names are household words.

The traditional furniture manufactures looked down on making anything out of �soft woods�. These Englishman considered the Irish to be ignorant, lazy and �beneath� them. Many of the English hardwood manufacturers would cut down the pine trees and pay the Irish immigrants to haul them away. These ignorant and lazy immigrants built their very successful businesses on the �free� raw materials of the arrogant English and Scotsman.

Irish bedroom furniture is a simple yet functional design utilizing rounded corners with dovetailed and mortised joints. But using hardware bracing where the softer wood needs it to maintain strength. Some is left �rustic� in appearance while other are sanded to a silky finish that stained and hard waxed to a lustrous shine. In all cases, Irish bedroom furniture is an attractive, practical and lower cost alternative to the higher priced hardwood styles.

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