flip the floor

I've had some time this weekend to spend on the portable stand. I've made a simple demountable base to raise the floor a bit and at the same time hold the back wall upright. One side of the wall I've opted for marble paneling. I've painted a beige marble that would match the wallpaper I'd chosen.

Cut it into tiles, and marbled a matching top trim and the plinth.

Glued them on some sturdy cardboard and that will be become the lower half of one wall. 

Still the upper part to do, but then one wall will be finished. I'm thinking of doing the other side with some sort of wainscot too. Something like the room box i'd made earlier?? Or as counter-balance it could be a sleek stark wall? Hmm, not sure yet. Depends on the combinations, cos....

The floor has parquet on one side and black and white tiles on the other. You can swap 'm round in a second, just like is possible with the backwall. Giving this display 4 combinations in total. The parquet has had it's third coat of oil now and it's looking better with each new one. 

What a change a flip of the floor can give!
Wish it was that easy in real life :)

parquet pattern

I'm making a small traveling-display with multiple designs. So i can swap the floor from parquet to tiles, or turn the wall from classic to contemporary... Here's the start

parquet floor

Cos I want to make some good pictures of this table before it's going to it's new home, i need a setting in which to stage it. I have one or two room-boxes but they just don't match. They are too shallow or don't have the right design and atmosphere I'm looking for. I've run into this lack of attribute before. So I figured I'd make me a nice slab of parquet flooring. Always handy to stack up the stock!

I had some wooden strips lying around; mahogany, beech, walnut and some pine. I thought to do a herring bone design and beech seemed the best fit for it.



I used MDF as base and drawn the design onto it. Then cut the over 400 pieces to size and started gluing them in position. I've used some big pieces of metal as weights to press while drying. The big piece is a cut section of railroad. Quite handy actually cos it's extremely heavy. It's placed upside down here, cos the top surface is smaller and that increases the pressure applied. The weight also makes it very stable so I usually have it right side up in use as an anvil.



Then some sanding and deciding what finish to give... I've opted for wax, as I've done before in Nolda's House. It's like Josje said just recently; It gives it that beautiful natural glow, so much better than varnish!



To see the color of the wood darken and deepen as you apply the wax is one of the most satisfying moments. It's like feeding a starved animal or watering a dried up plant. You see it transform and come to life...



The next thing to do is to make some walls. I've found me a nice sea-green faux-silk wallpaper that works great with most shades of wood. But first a few more layers of waxing and buffing.

enjoy your weekend,