The Golden State: Where & How to Live, Secure, Visit, Enjoy and Thrive in California

Furniture Finishing

Outline stencils represent a compromise between pattern and free-hand decoration. The small dashes act as a guide when transferred with burnt umber or burnt sienna to the ground color of the surface similar to the charcoal dust pouncing used in hand painting. It is most favored where an antique glaze is employed, the glaze being wiped out of the pattern while still wet so as to leave a light uniform surface on which to apply the stencil color with an artist's brush. Such a design may of course be shaded and high-lighted as suggested by the nature of the original being copied.

Double stencils have for their object the transferring of a pattern without showing the blanks left by ties. A one-color ordinary stencil cannot be made to produce two-color work without the necessity of filling in different parts of the same stencil in different colors with the attendant risk of smearing or getting a color in the wrong opening. Two operations are of course inquired with a double stencil, the second stencil either supplying -what is lacking in the design of the first by reason of the ties or being used to fill in a portion of the pattern in another color. Examples would be a continuous band or a leaf—stem and rose spray respectively, the former in one color showing no ties, the second in two colors showing ties.

The so-called silk screen stencil has of late years acquired great popularity due to its flexibility of use. The material used is No. 8 bolting silk costing about $9.00 a yard, cut and stretched tight in a wooden frame of desired size. A design is cut from 5/1000" thick sheet celluloid with a knife and placed on a table; the silk screen is placed over this and amyl-acetate coated on, pressing the silk at the same time against the celluloid. This partially dissolves the sheet, uniting it where desired to the fabric and forms a permanent stencil. Another method is to shellac a sheet of manila paper, then cut the design out after which the paper when dry can be attached to the silk by pressing it with a warm iron.

This should be done against the back of the paper so that the iron does not come in contact with the shellac. Silk stencils are virtually "tie-less" in that the color works under the threads and shows no mesh on the surface.