Another Testimonial From a Past Grad

Gerald Cartwright Graduated in 1998. He currently lives and works in Harrison, AR, where he runs his own finishing shop - Cartwright Wood Finishing Company

"In May of 1997, I attended a woodworking trade show in Little Rock, AR. It was through this show that I made a chance contact with a former graduate of the DCTC Wood Finishing Technology Program. The successful graduate explained the course work, skill sets learned, and the joy of knowing how to repair furniture. From this meeting, I was inspired to contact Mitch Kohanek at DCTC.
I graduated the Wood Finishing Technology Program at DCTC in June of 1998.
After graduating from the Wood Finishing Technology Program at DCTC, I was employed with a high end commercial furniture dealer in the Twin Cities area. My position was Manager, Restoration Services. I was tasked with starting a furniture service department at this company. Upon the completion of 2.5 years of employment, I was given the opportunity to purchase all of the assets of the service department and provide service through a sub-contractor arrangement.
In mid 2001, I relocated back to north central Arkansas, the area where I was raised. I started a furniture services company in Harrison, AR. My services include furniture refinishing, pre-finishing, and furniture touch-up, serving both commercial and residential customers.
The skill sets I learned at DCTC from Mitch Kohanek has allowed me to repair and finish anything with great confidence. All of the technical skills learned at DCTC Wood Finishing Technology Program are applied in my current business.
Mitch Kohanek is an inspiring teacher who can communicate his skills to those who care to learn."

Wood 1019 Spot Repair II: Joe Renchin Spends the Day Talking Upholstery

NIWF Advisory Board Member and Master Upholsterer, Joe Renchin Came in today for another great demonstration on upholstery. Joe has spent 35 years in the business and he is always happy to share his expertise with the students at NIWF. He spoke extensively about the business of upholstery and demonstrated stripping down an upholstered piece, then recovering, as one might need to do to repair something inside of an upholstered piece of furniture. He also demonstrated different methods of fastening upholstery to an object, making and attaching buttons, blind stitching and more.

Joe has been a friend of the program here for many years, and we can't thank him enough for the time he spends here preparing our students to meet any situation head on with the knowledge and skill set that may be needed by the professional wood finisher.

Wood 1019 Spot Repair II: Ken Norgard Visits to Demonstrate Leather & Vinyl Repair

This week we are having Ken Norgard spend a few days with the class demonstrating leather & Vinyl repair, which can be an important part of the on-the-road touch-up artists job. The students practiced using an array of repair products on a number of different scenarios such as scrapes & scratches, cuts, punctures and more. Along with attending to the damage, the students also put their color theory to use and matched paints to mask their repairs, then finally coating them to protect them and match texture and sheen as well.

The students had a great time getting to use this new medium, while still applying what they have already learned to this new skill set. A big thanks to Ken for passing on some of his knowledge on the business of leather & vinyl repair.

Wood 1019 Spot Repair II: Jerry Behrens visits DCTC again to talk touch-up

Today we had our old friend Jerry Behrens back to talk touch-up work. You might remember Jerry from an older blog post, as he is a regular visitor to the program. Jerry graduated from NIWF in 1989, and has served on the board since 1992. He has also written, produced, and hosted two Wood Restoration Videos and has been gainfully employed in the field of wood finishing for 20 years.

Today Jerry was showing some of his techniques for doing spot repairs. Like I tell my students, if you see 10 different repair people doing a repair, you'll see 10 different ways to do the repair. So it's great to get some past grads in to show off their techniques, it exposes the students to a variety of solutions to a problem. Jerry was using colored graining pencils for one repair he demonstrated. He also shared some insight on color matching, working in the field, and did a large repair on a cupboard door.

Both repairs only took about 25 minutes and looked great when he was done; and he was able to pull them off while talking to students and answering questions. A big thanks once again to Jerry for sharing his time and talents with our students.

Wood 1019 Spot Repair II: Past Grad Dave Smith, Guest lecturing at DCTC

If you follow the blog, you've already met Dave Smith in an older blog post from January, but if you are new to the blog, let me introduce Dave again. Dave Smith graduated from NIWF in 1994, and since then has been working in the field. He is part owner of Fresh Air Finishers, a finishing company that specializes in the restoration of historic interior woodwork and wood finishes. They also maintain and repair modern wood furnishings. Fresh Air Finishers uses environmentally and human friendly products with no residual odors. Specializing in green finishing has been a passion and a great avenue for them, as more and more consumers are looking for an eco-friendly alternative to solvents and chemicals . Dave and the whole crew are professionally preserving & restoring wood throughout the United States from their St. Paul, MN headquarters.

Dave came in today to show us some of his techniques for some advanced spot repair. Here we see him replacing a broken piece from a chair with an epoxy fill.






After filling the void, he shaped it to the original shape of the chair.









Next he painted in the background color.







Finally, with some skilled in-painting, it begins to take on it's original look. With a bit more attention and some coating on this chair, this repair would become almost invisible.





Throughout the year, we continue to learn techniques like these, and it's always a pleasure to have past grads come in to show their skills! Thanks Dave!

A Testimonial‏ From a Past Graduate

I’d like to write about my experience at NIWF. I graduated in 2000. This nine month course was demanding. Mitch (the instructor) set high standards and challenged us. The course is designed to enable you to succeed, not just get a job.
After graduation I worked for a refinishing shop that readily employed NIWF graduates because the owner knew the graduates were qualified, professional, and required little training. This employment was valuable in that it taught me the real world of furniture finishing as a business. That is, dealing with customers, how to make a profit, and what it takes to run a finishing business.

I moved to Virginia 4 years later and started my own business. Make no mistake; this was not easy. I now have the largest finishing shop in my town. I have 4 wonderful employees who love the work as I do. We are still struggling but business gets better each year.

Because of NIWF, I have the most rewarding career. I and my employees enjoy coming to work every day.

Dick Patch

Astonish Furniture Restoration
2000 Graduate
Roanoke VA

Wood 1015 Spot Repair I: HOM Furniture visits DCTC to demonstrate spot repair technique

Three past Grads from NIWF who now work for HOM Furniture came in today to share some of their repair techniques with us and talk a bit about life in the field. They demonstrated burn-in techniques to fill and repair scratches, a flocking technique to repair micro-fibre and leather and vinyl repair as well. It was an interesting visit, the students got to see many different techniques for simulating wood grain & matching color, and they were introduced to some new tools as well.



It is always gratifying to see past students become the professionals and to watch them teach the new group of future pros!

Wood 1015 Spot Repair I: French Padding Color

French Padding color onto a wooden object is part of Spot Repair. In these pictures you can see very worn wood, all the finish and much of the color has been worn away from years of use.






We can apply pigment to the wood, then use a French Padding technique to lock in the color.
















The end result, we have replaced color and replaced coating so our color is protected.

Wood 1015 Spot Repair I: Fixing vertical surfaces

Not all of our repairs are convenient to get to all the time. Sometimes you have repairs on walls, floor boards, door frames and other hard to reach areas. We try to simulate that here in the classroom. You can see the students doing whatever it takes to perform professional repairs in the hard to reach spots.
The techniques we use for vertical repairs are the same as any other, but the mechanics of it change as our range of motion can become limited, and gravity takes hold of our materials.

Wood 1015 Spot Repair I: Repairing a scratch

We are back at it in 2009 doing some spot reapirs. In Spot Repair I we learn to clean, fill, and hide scratches in wood. In the following pictures you can see damage to this piece of furniture. It has been filled with a plastic. Once the voids are filled and level and smooth, we begin painting in color and mimicing the grain pattern in the wood. finnally we protect our repair by giving in a coat of finish to seal the color into the repair.

Techniques like these are used everyday by professionals.

Wood 1012 Color Theory - Using New Mediums

Color Theory is the root of much of what we do. We can not repair a wooden object and hide that repair unless we can match the color of the wood and the coating on the wood. In color theory, we will make color wheels, and learn how colors relate to one another. We look at hue, value and chroma; and we learn how different mediums work differently.
In the first picture, you can see we are color matching, that is to say, the students are given a sample of wood and asked to find a mixture of colorants that will match. Currently we are using glazes to find that match, but in the near future, we will use powdered pigments, dyes as well as using different glazing and toning techniques to achieve a match.

In this second picture, we are discovering our powdered pigments. With these powders, we can mix them with a binder and carrier and make a paint. In this picture we are charting out what these colors look like on a white background so we can start to understand how they will behave when we start using them on wood.

2009-2010 School Year Begins

Another year has begun with a fresh group of students. Once again we will be chronicling the year in order to show a prospective student what the NIWF experience is. The Wood Finishing Technology Program is a 36-credit course; all 36 credits are in wood finishing with no other gen-ed requirements. You can follow our curriculum throughout the year by class title. The 9 month program (August 2009-May 2010) is broken up into nine classes:


Wood 1012 Color Theory
Wood 1015 Spot Repair I
Wood 1019 Spot Repair II
Wood 1004 Wood Working
Wood 1007 Methods of Fastening
Wood 1010 Wood and Finishing Technology
Wood 1026 Advanced Finishing
Wood 1032 Furniture Conservation
Wood 1021 Wood Refinishing

Each course is approximately 17 working days and is set up in a way that one could take just one or two courses, please refer to the DCTC catalog for more information on classes that might have a pre-requisite at www.DCTC.edu

Most of the blog posts will be titled with the corresponding class, so if you want to know what goes on in any of these classes, stay tuned and see first hand what and how we learn! And be sure to go back in the blog are read about last year.

On a side note, NIWF offers a Furniture Service Technician certificate program for completing the first three courses (Color Theory, Spot Repair I & Spot Repair II). Furniture Service Technicians repair minor damage (referred to as spot repair) to wood, vinyl, leather and fabric. Spot repair usually involves (but is certainly not limited to) repairs such as minor water damage, scratches, nicks, dents, cigarette burns, or even a fairly large damaged area such as the corner of a table. These repairs are made by filling the void with a solid material and applying color to it, matching the surrounding area. Leather and vinyl repair is done much the same way. Upholstery can be repaired without having to re-upholster the entire piece.Furniture refurbishing means cleaning (instead of stripping) furniture and furniture maintenance (polishing and waxing).Furniture Service Technicians may work at the customer's home site, in furniture stores, or in a workshop. Possible job opportunities include self-employment, furniture stores or outlets, or an existing furniture service business. While total furniture restoration requires a workshop setting, the Furniture Service Technician can work from a small toolbox.