Sausha, from Sweet Pickins has wrote another excellent tutorial. Sausha told me about this trick a few months back. It's has worked every sing time I've used it. The results are amazing! Without further ado, here is Sausha!
Ive been using shellac for a few
years now, clear shellac works perfect for blocking bleed through on
painted pieces and is also great for sealing in musty smells on
furniture. It goes on clear and dries super fast. Its an awesome
product with lots of uses.
BUT, about 6 months ago i was playing
around as i like to do, and figured out some cool stuff that it does
with milk paint. It was purely by accident as all the best discoveries
are!
I’ve been hesitant to post the info
because im still experimenting with it – but i think i have enough info
to share with ya now :)
DISCLOSURE: For the most part my shellac
trick has worked great on the things im going to tell you about. BUT,
milk paint still has a tendency to do its own thing even with the
shellac and i cant guarantee that its going to come out like the
examples that i have. Like i said, ive been using it for about 6 months
now and these are my general conclusions. Please test on your own
piece before doing the whole thing!!
………………………………………………….
K – this is what i use….
Zinsser clear shellac. Its about $7.50 a
can and is just in the stain isle at home depot or lowes. You can also
get it in quarts or gallons.
And this is what i have found….
1. Using shellac as a “primer” for milk paint
If i have a piece that is really shiny with a smooth finish on it, then i use the shellac rather than using Extra Bond
with my milk paint to get a perfect chippy and sometimes crackly
finish. It is normally recommended when painting over something with a
high shine to use the extra bond to ensure adhesion, in this case im
using the shellac as a “primer” for my milk paint. The pic below shows
an antique dresser with a thick lacquered (or shellacked?) original
clear coat and it was pretty shiny. I sprayed the piece twice with
shellac and let it dry in between coats. The shellac dries pretty
quick, so this goes really fast. I normally just do 2 coats so i can
make sure that i have covered the entire surface.
I have found, if i let the shellac
completely dry (only about 5 minutes depending on the outside temp)
before putting on my milk paint, then i will get the “perfect chippy”
look with the milk paint. If i paint on my milk paint while the shellac
is still a bit tacky (over a previously stained piece) then the milk
paint will come off in bigger chips. So it would just depend on the
look that your going for.
Now why use shellac rather than just using the Extra Bond?
- Because with shellac the milk paint
has a tendency to chip because its resisting the surface. If i added
the bond, i most likely wouldn’t get any chipping. I have found with
the shellac i get chipping almost every time when im painting over a
previously stained piece. The shellac also does really cool things
with giving a crackly/alligatored finish.
How do i know i wouldn’t have just got this “chippy” if i skipped the shellac and the Extra Bond?
- I don’t for sure. Actually, i do know
i wouldn’t have gotten this chippy with the bond because i rarely get
any chipping when ive added the bond. But i know from experience, if i
had of just painted this piece with no shellac and no bond, then most
likely the paint wouldn’t have adhered as well as it did and i most
likely would have gotten bigger “chips” in the paint instead of smaller
chipping all over. I know this because the piece had a high shine to it
and wasn’t porous at all, the old finish was in really good shape. (to
see a post about using Extra Bond, click here)
This pic below shows a piece when i
was experimenting with the shellac and tried both ways on one piece. I
had started painting the piece with extra bond (and no shellac) on the
right hand side and you can see that i didn’t get any chipping with the
milk paint. I then sprayed the left hand side with a couple coats of
clear shellac and then painted milk paint over it (with no extra bond)
and you can see that i got light chipping all over. The paint still
stuck really well overall, but i did get the chipping that i like. This
was a piece from the 70ies with a thick lacquered clear coat, im almost
positive that if i skipped the bond and the shellac and just used
straight milk paint, all my paint would have just flaked off.
2. Shellac over metal with no Extra Bond
I have found that the shellac trick works
well with metal too. I don’t have a finished piece to show of this
one, but i will post pics soon. I just wanted to include this in my
findings so far :)
Rather than using the extra bond mixed
with milk paint, i sprayed the shellac 1st onto the shiny painted metal,
then milk painted and the paint stuck very well, i was really
surprised. My hopes were that i would still get chipping with the
shellac over the metal rather then using the extra bond and not getting
any chipping. I’m still experimenting with metal and i only did these
couple of pieces. I need to finish up the project and let you know if i
get any chipping!
(piece on the left is sprayed with
shellac 1st, painted with no extra bond. piece on the right is painted
with no shellac and no bond, clearly it didn’t stick!!)
3. Shellac over a previously painted piece
When painting over a previously painted
piece, i have found that if you spray shellac over the old finish before
milk painting, then you get this amazing crackling! This has worked
for me every time ive tried this so far and i love it!
So far when spraying shellac 1st over an
old (or newly) painted finish, i haven’t gotten a ton of chipping, just a
lot of crackling which looks really good, especially when dark waxed.
I’ve also noticed that when i spray
shellac over previously painted finishes, it seals in that layer of
paint and it keeps it from chipping up with the 1st layer of milk paint.
Otherwise, the 1st layer of milk paint if it chipped, would most
likely take the old paint finish with it. Again, it would just depend
on the look that your going for.
4. Shellac under milk paint with Extra Bond
I had one instance when i used the Extra
Bond on a newer piece of furniture and i still wasn’t getting good
adhesion on a couple of spots. I ended up spraying some shellac on the
spots and then going back over those spots with milk paint mixed with
Extra Bond and the paint stuck really well. I ended up finding out that
my milk paint with the bond wasn’t adhering because there was a thick
coat of waxy furniture polish over the whole thing – ugghhh!!! But the
bond in the milk paint along with spraying it with shellac 1st made the
paint stick like crazy!
So im thinking that if you had a really
“iffy” surface that you were trying to paint (plastic or a high shine
laminate) that it may be beneficial to spray the shellac 1st in addition
to adding Extra Bond to your milk paint.
5. Shellac as your final coat over milk paint
One of the great things about milk paint
is that you can use any top coat on the market to seal in the paint and
protect it from getting dirty. Shellac is perfect for a top coat and is
super durable. You want to be careful though about using it over
whites as the shellac does have a yellow cast to it and can make your
white colors look yellow. I would most likely test in a spot over any
color your using it over and make sure you are ok with the final color.
Shellac really deepens and brightens up milk paint and brings out all
the multi-tonal qualities that are characteristic of milk paint.
6. Shellac as a stain/bleed through blocker and odor concealer
Shellac works perfect for blocking bleed
through on any piece your going to paint. If you have a piece that has
an old red stain to it that keeps coming through your paint, shellac
works really well to block it from coming through. Even if you have
started painting your piece with milk paint and didnt use shellac, you
can use shellac between coats of milk paint and the milk paint will
still adhere fine. Normally for strong bleed through, you might need to
give it 5-8 coats. But it dries really quick so it wont take long at
all.
Shellac is also great for blocking smelly
odors. It works great for inside of old trunks or dresser drawers.
Just give it a couple coats and it should seal in those old odors and
block them from coming through.
………………………………………………
So, in conclusion, i love the shellac
under milk paint because it really helps give me that overall chippy
look on pieces that i normally would have used the Extra Bond
on. The shellac seems to get me the perfect chippy look but i still
get good adhesion on most of the piece. I will still keep trying it out
and trying new things with it and let you know what i find out!!
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