Wainscottish

 As usual towards 11 pm I began thinking of installing the stair wainscotting, something I had put off by making the shell mirror. My time was not lost as you could see in the previous post. 

I had glued the doorframe that leads to the drawing room to the left of the hallway the night before and weighed it down for a few hours it had slightly warped. I spent hours looking at hallways and panelling and wainscotting on my computer until I decided on this very simple one. I used mount board for the initial sections and 350 gram kraft/mdf card for the next layers. I finished the top with a small obeche strip of wood that overhangs slightly.I had to be careful not to make the panelling thicker than the base board of the staircase. 

 A slightly odd picture photographed flat on the table in actual daylight ! I placed the staircase on the wall to check the fit. I cannot glue the stair in place as yet as much as I would like to. I have to glue the stair to the hallway floor and then install this wall to the left before continuing the stairs and landings.

 A closer photo, the paint actually looks much more blue than in reality. 

Below you can see the layers. Mount board and kraft card. I built up the middle section in two layers of Kraft and the uprights and top sections in Mount board then kraft. I will smooth over the layers with a filler mix then gesso before painting. 

The end side to the left of the door, you can see slightly better the layering. I glued this piece of wood the edge of this wall in order to have something to butt the panelling against. I still don't know how yet to best finish the eges of all the walls you see on opening the front of the house but I have lots of time to think on it.

This is a mock up before the painting. Whenever you make anything it's best to make a mock up piece to scale in order to practice on. Here I used a shop bought Poly filler and smoothed it with my finger dipped in a little water. Too much water will damage the card.

 Here I brushed on two layers of mat white paint which acts like gesso. This should be done before sanding slightly. Sandpaper scrapes off the top layer of card so has to be protected.

In this photo I have painted two coats of final paint colour, the same as the stairs and woodwork.

A closer detail. The filler and layers of gesso and paint smoothes over the card layers and gives the impression of classic wood panelling. In real life the effect is rather good.

Here I rubbed down the paint to age it slightly then varnished it with matt acrylic varnish. Next step is to rub down with fine wire wool and then maybe a slight wax and buff. 

Now all I have to do it paint the real panelling in one go. Maybe tomorrow in daylight.

Finally Dora asked me to include a photo of her on her sofa. She is trying to give me the stare, hypnotising me into giving her a treat, she hasn't quite perfected it yet.