Wow. What a lot of work. But the results speak for themselves!
Ylva
18-Nov-2006 22:56
My sister Ingela helped her, but says she would now need a written instruction to be able to repeat it on her own. She says the process is more or less as follows: First you form a mould by hand from some type of clay. Then you wet calf hide which you stretch across the mould. After that you model it with special tools. The hide has to dry for a fortnight afterwards, until it has assumed the shape of the mould. The next step is to cover the hide with three covers of a sticky type of laquer. While it s still sticky, you attach very thin sheets of silver, which was the case when this seat was made, or even golden sheets. Laquer time again, now with "schellack" (I hope it's the same in English). Now it's time to paint the seats with oil paint, artist colours! Finally three layers of a laquer called "saponlack" in Swedish. It takes a while for each layer to dry, so to make a seat like this, you have to allow one month before you can actually use it. Now, we haven't even mentioned the procedure of mounting the hide on a chair, a nice box, or instead of wall paper on a wall, which was done in many old castles.So, you have to get going in November if you want to make a Christmas present of what we call "Golden leather". And don't forget that you must renew the last coat of laquer every once in a blue moon, depending on the wear of the object it is on...
