The Boundary Woodworkers Guild has restored an old bank desk, which is now on display at the Greenwood Museum.
The desk, which was donated by Jo Ann Sergeant, was in the possession of her late-mother Josephine (Jo) Thompson and had become dilapidated.
“Basically, when we got the desk it was weathered from being outside. The top was a mahogany veneer that had completely separated, so we couldn’t save it,” Boundary Museum Director and guild member Bob DeMaertelaere explained.
He said that as well as replacing the top of the desk, the restoration work also included replacing and rebuilding two missing drawers.
“The entire piece is made out of cedar and we surmise that it was built locally – it doesn’t look like it came out of any factory, which makes it even more interesting,” described DeMaertelaere. “It was basically finished with a shellac and wax.”
“The whole thing needed a lot of work,” added Boundary Woodworkers Guild President Jake Raven.
“I remember one of our members was staining it for I don’t know how long, in order to get it back into that old colour.”
Sergeant said her mother didn’t like to throw away old things.
“She passed away and we were going through her things and so we called the museum about some of the older things that she had,” Sergeant said.
“We got a hold of the Greenwood Museum and also the (Boundary) Museum, because we had things we donated to them and they talked to the Greenwood Museum and told them they would refinish it for them.“
Sergeant was amazed at how the woodworkers were able to restore the desk and Greenwood Heritage Society President Marge Maclean was very pleased as well.
“Bob sent us pictures of the before and he said, ‘We will restore it for you. It looks pretty good to me, it doesn’t look too bad.’ I thought it looked terrible. Why are we even bothering with it?” Maclean said with a laugh.
“Now? We can’t believe it.”
RDKB Area D Director Irene Perepolkin and the Boundary Museum Society contributed funding for the project.
DeMaertelaere also said that guild member Stuart Soles did a lot of work on the bank desk.
“Unfortunately Stuart broke his leg and had to move back to Golden,” he said.