Caring for old wood - furniture polish?

[gotpasswords]

This was going to be too far off topic for the disposable stuff thread, so here’s a question for Lissa:

*Originally posted by Lissa *
The museum in which I work is a big consumer of these things, as well as Swiffer dusting cloths. The reason why is the residue that the traditional method of Pledge-and-a-rag leaves behind on surfaces. Furniture polish residue can seriously damage the finish of antiques.

and…

**My curator would faint dead away of he found me using water-dampened rags on any of our wood artifacts. Even though the water evaporates quickly, it’s not a good idea, since wetting the surface and letting it dry over and over can damage the surface over the long term. Humidity is an enemy of wood furniture. **

So… what’s the thing to use? Not just for antiques, but for “everyday” wood furniture?

FWIW, I don’t like Pledge and its ilk as they either leave the room smelling like plastic lemons or kerosene.

[porcupine]

Viagra?

[romansperson]

I don’t think you are supposed to use anything other than a soft clean cloth on antiques - anything else will take away the ‘patina’ that antique collectors are supposed to covet.

We use a product on our modern furniture that is a combination of orange oil and beeswax. It does an excellent job. My husband gets it at woodworkers’ conventions, but I’m sure it’s available elsewhere.

[katie1341]

I like “Liquid Gold” for our wood furniture- I have some older stuff that I’m not sure qualifies as “antique”, but it does a nice job and doesn’t smell like plastic lemons.

[Lissa]

Well, the answer depends on whether you want your modern furniture to be an antique someday. If these are pieces you plan to hand down through the family, I suggest you start treating them like antiques now.

I strongly recommend you don’t use *any * polishes when dusting. Even the ones which claim to leave no residue leave a trace of themselves behind.

We used to use Endust, which is supposed be residue-free. As an added precaution against getting too much on the surface, we were instructed to lightly spray the rag, not the item to be dusted, and to never use so much polish as to make the rag damp with it. (Just a few “squirts” to do an entire room.)

In one of our rooms is a table with a heavy item on top of it. There’s no way to move the item, so to dust, you have to reach behind it, but you can never quite get completely around. The other day, my curator moved the heavy item, and was aghast at what he saw. Even with all of our precautions, you could clearly see the the difference between the “polished” area and the place we couldn’t reach. It was amazing that such a residue had built up in just a few years time.

[Eva_Luna]

My grandparents, who did 40+ years in the antique business, would always use genuine lemon oil (not Pledge) on wood furniture. Smells like real llemons, which is a lovely smell!