Circa 1880's
Restoration For Our Friend Lisa
Completed May 2008
nice shape to it and decent hardware, just had a hard life and needs a hand. Structurally, there were
three shattered boards including side walls, top and bottom, and the entire back board on the top.
Plenty of metal damage, 3.5 hinges, and its fair share of rust. These are problems but nothing
mentally as challenging as the pink painted interior circa 1961 over wood.
The interior is to be covered in material Lisa provided us so the first order of business was make the
pink go away. Pink is fine for some, but it generally brings about a hopeless feeling in the trunk
world. With the pink now history, the hinges were removed to allow each piece to be worked on
independently. With cost being somewhat of a concern, it was decided to repair what was there if
possible rather than a total rebuild of the box. Fairly thin reenforcement panels were cut to fit and a
spreader used to push the walls back out to square. The panels were then secured using glue and
nails to the original walls and then the metal trim and banding re-secured. Once the interior is
covered, it will be very difficult to tell anything of the sort was done. The metal repairs lined up pretty
well and the seams are being connected using a liquid metal to eliminate sharp edges. One section
on the back wall of the dome had pulled out from there it used to be tucked under the wood slat. It
was cut short originally and would not make the turn to tuck back under and simply affixed using a
wood to metal epoxy and then sealed as best I could to prevent sharp edges. With this all completed
the rust was removed and the top now fit on the bottom which it did not when received. The very
bottom was cleaned of all rust as well and given its initial coat.
The slats will be taken a little darker and nails are falling out like apples from a tree so plenty of this
and that to attend to.
shot of the interior redone in a material depicting various outdoor scenes from the past
none of the metal work is overly distracting.