I'm seeing more chinoiserie and urushi in the studio these days. It's one of my favourite types of furniture to restore, so I'm really happy about that. When I was an apprentice I loved working on lacquer furniture. It took me a long time to develop enough skill to copy the brushwork. The Japanese craftsmen were just so incredibly talented and had such control over their lines. I still marvel at how perfect the gold work is.
This first picture is of a water mark on an urishi lacquer table. The white blob is something I use to remove marks. Easy when you know how! There aren't any chemicals that can remove water marks from urushi, but there is a simple technique that does it. Well, I say simple, it's time consuming and takes a lot of patience, but as you can see from the second picture, it really works.
