PAINTING A NEW FINISH ON AN ELEGANT WINDOW CORNICE

PAINTING A NEW FINISH ON AN ELEGANT WINDOW CORNICE

Today I was working on another pair of those very elegant cornices.  Half of the fleur de lis was a patina green and my client did not want that color in her living room.  Also, the cornices were a bright, bright gold leaf finish and she wanted me to tone the gold down a bit.

I'm seriously busy working, concentrating and I forgot to take a photo of the bright, bright gold.  In the top photo you can see a bit of the green patina that I'm covering. 

They were really beautiful, but the green and bright gold just didn't work in this room.

TUTORIAL

A dark chocolate brown is the color I used to darken or tone them down.  Used an eggshell paint, but you can use what you have, craft paint or whatever.  I used a small brush and painted small areas and then wiped off with a rag and left dark brown in the crevices and folds.  After I finished with the chocolate brown, I used a metallic gold and swiped my brush all over the fleur de lis, making it tie in with the rest of the colors on the cornice.  

My client was approving each step and she was very happy with the final finish.

THEN, I forgot to take a photo of the finished cornices!!  I think I will be going back for more work, next month and will try to remember to take photos.  Only one problem...if they've already been installed 20' high on the wall (above the most beautiful windows that overlook landscaping and a golf course), that could be a problem for my picture taking!!  So, be brave!  If you have something that is just too colorful, wrong color, etc., use another color and age it, patina it, change it!