[Woodcarver] Staining Basswood

[Bill Smith]

hi alex:

another way to put color to your finished piece of
bass wood is to go to the local store n look for the
shoe dye can find it in walmart or in your grocery
store or any place that sells shoe dye.. It comes in
different colors and they have talked about it in
scroll sawing..

Bill Smith

--- Alex Bisso <albisso at bresnan.net> wrote:

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> I recently was in a class with Jeff Phares and
> carved a mountain man bust in
> a large piece of clear, very light colored basswood.
>  It carved very well
> but I had a hard time imagining it look good with a
> natural finish as one
> would do with butternut but Jeff had a solution for
> this.  When his basswood
> carvings are ready for a finish, he first dyes them
> with a transluscent
> analine dye.  I do not know a brand name but
> apparently they are readily
> available and come as a powder.  The color he
> recommended is "caramel".  He
> had some "concentrate" that he had made from the
> powder following the
> instructions on the container.  Then he mixed a
> small amount of the
> concentrate with a cup of water (looked like about
> 2-3 tablespoons)to get
> the dye solution to use.  This was painted liberally
> on the whole carving,
> wetting it all thoroughly with the excess then being
> brushed off.  After
> this was done and completely dried, any normal
> finish could be used.  Jeff
> uses some Bartley gel varnish thinned with mineral
> spirits to the
> consistency of linseed oil.  After a couple of coats
> of this light varnish
> mixture and while still wet, color can be added with
> oil paints using the
> gel varnish/mineral spirits solution as a medium to
> make a wash with the oil
> paint.
> I actually did not complete and finish my carving at
> the class so I brought
> a small amount of his dye concentrate home to try. 
> It was a bit scarey to
> do but I really do liked the results.  Although I
> have not yet finished the
> sub-base, I posted a photo of the carving on
> PictureTrail at
>
http://www.picturetrail.com/gallery/view?p=999&gid=583547&uid=467059
> I did some coloring with oil paints on most of the
> mountain man (very little
> blush added to the face) but all of the carved base
> is only the dyed
> basswood with the Bartley gel varnish finish.  After
> the varnish/paint was
> dried all of the carving was sprayed with deft,
> semi-gloss finish and a
> final finish of Watco satin finishing was (50/50
> dark/clear) was used.
> 
> Alex Bisso
> Billings, MT  59106
> 
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