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Wednesday, July 16, 2014

WEDNESDAY SKILLS: Recreating a Wax Seal

It's been a while since I've posted, and I apologize, but I've been so busy.  However, I haven't forgotten about ya'll.  Here's a project we worked on last month at the shop.  It was a sand-blasted wood sign, and the customer had asked for what looked like one of those old wax seals that you'd see in official mail and what-not.  My boss provided me with a picture and a piece of 1" thick foam.  I used a drill press to score a large recessed area in the middle, and began chiseling away at the block.
 After getting the shape roughed out, I sanded all of the harsh edges with a piece of 80 grit sandpaper.  All of the corners and rough edges were rounded and smoothed out.  Then I put a coat of plain white latex primer on the piece.
 After the primer dried, I took some regular drywall paste and filled in the hole left by the drill bit in the center.  When that dried, I put on a coat of white 1-Shot paint.  (For those that aren't familiar, 1-Shot is a paint originally made and still marketed to sign painters.  It's oil-based, and freakin awesome.)
 After the white 1-Shot dried, it was time for some color.  We chose a maroon 1-Shot for the second coat.  One of the nicest things about 1-Shot is that when you put it down, it really flattens out for a nice, smooth, even finish.  I had an idea in my head of what this was going to look like, and this really exceeded my expectations at this point.
After the maroon paint dried, I put on a second coat, just to make sure that the color would dry in a rich, color.  It wound up really looking like melted wax.  When the second coat dried, we got some imitation gold vinyl and cut out the letter and ornamental ring and stuck it down on the middle of the emblem.
 Here's the finished product.  The outside border of the sign was stained with a regular wood stain.  The background was painted with a latex beige paint, and the inner border and letters were painted with 1-Shot.  The wax seal piece really brought it all together.  Check it out!