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Coffin cases - not the usual restorations
I had a bunch of old cases lying around, and stimulated by a few recent acquisitions, decided to try out some restorations of coffin cases. To start out, here are some originals:
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The originals were fairly shiny, often had a decorative wrapping on the inside, and across the board had a red painted lip inside. Any holes in the cases can be repaired with papier-mache techniques. I fixed a few like this. Then the cases can be sealed with a thin layer of wood glue (a PVA glue). The original outer finish was as easy as black spray paint followed by an acrylic clearcoat. Here are a couple with the inside unchanged from the original decorative paper, but the outside has been restored:
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Based on the first Greaves case pictured, the wrapper could actually be fairly vibrant marbled paper. Here is a full restoration of an early 1800s Greaves case. The marbled paper is fairly thin and was attached by soaking the back in a thinned PVA glue mixture, followed by a wood glue top coat:
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A Wade & Butcher case, using the same techniques:
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Finally, a large W&B case with the purple inner restored:
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