Special Who sells which products for giving wood an aged look?

WHEN WOOD STANDS STILL

OPTIONS FOR HIGHLY NATURAL CHEMICAL DISTRESSING ARE WELL NIGH ENDLESS

Gérard Poulet (Easy Lab – F)

“You can obtain any colour yourself by combining products.”

Gérard Poulet from Easy Lab has been active for several years on the market of distressing products for wood. The company operates from Lyon and since its formation has made products for the restoration, renovation, and maintenance of mainly furniture and works of art and their surrounds, but he now operates more widely. For many years, the company has been led by Gérad Poulet, who formed it in 1989. Initially, the operation started on a small scale.

Mr Poulet comments: ‘When you restore furniture, you have to add old wood or find a way to restore it. Therefore, we decided to make a range of products which enabled us to distress wood in various ways. This included both wood sorts which contain resin and oak. The time came when we noticed how demand was growing vastly and that in the short term we had to go to several bigger supply containers. That’s how we grew to where we are today, with the supply of products which can give an antiquated aspect to just about all wood sorts.’

Small production in Los Angeles

Easy Lab has now extended its operations beyond the borders of Europe and even has a small production plant in Los Angeles. There’s a practical reason for that: ‘The American market attracted us, but transport to and from there presented problems. The products overheated in the containers, so we decided to produce locally. This involves solely oxidising products for wood and the production itself is fairly modest.’

‘For that matter, in Europe I work mainly with agents and they can be found in virtually every country, including the Benelux, Italy, Austria, Spain, and Germany and especially in the former Eastern Block. These people represent me locally and take care of demands from those countries.’

The colour narrative

We also wanted to know how Mr Poulet applies the narrative of the diverse colours. ‘Actually, all colours are possible,’ our interviewee clarifies. ‘We have all the possible products which users can then combine with each other for an extremely personalised end result as regards colour. We also give training sessions on our own site so that we can clearly illustrate the main oxidising processes to users. Once we’ve done that, you notice how you can obtain any desired result. Here I can add that I see a clear trend towards colours like honey, cognac clear, or pastels.’

Also active on the chalet market

We also wanted to know who the clients actually are. They appear to range from very big players such as Baltic Wood, Chêne de l’Est, or Bimbo to much smaller buyers. What’s remarkable is the rising demand from the chalet industry.

‘Newly distressed chalets are a real hype,’ says Mr Poulet with a laugh. ‘Firstly, those chalets are distressed on site, then we carry out our colour distressing, and after that you can’t distinguish a new chalet from an old one. We can even tackle the four sides of a chalet separately, depending on the orientation and there are even products for processing metal.’

‘The main advantage of these treatments is they go on and on and move with the times. Once the wood is treated, it develops naturally and you get genuine distressing with no pigments or colouring.’

Finally, we wanted to know how Easy Lab responds to the increasingly strict environmental requirements. Apparently, they don’t really have a problem in that respect. Our interviewee stresses: ‘We don’t have any hazardous products and nothing is toxic. Obviously, you can’t really call these products ecological, but they do not cause any major problems to the environment and we don’t have to take any special precautions.

Distressing wooden floors is still all the rage. Actually, we have to say that this is true not only for floors, but also for just about all possible types of wood both in and outdoors. The testimonial with this article shows that demand is varied. Amongst other things, it appears there is a huge demand for artificially distressed wooden chalets, which can hardly be distinguished from naturally aged ones. First of all, they are furnished with traces of use and, after that, ‘the chemistry’ does the rest.

Actually, such a demand for distressed wood really shouldn’t surprise us. The range of really old is both small and very costly and, moreover, the various techniques and, especially, the chemical products have developed in such a way that you really have to look closely to see the difference.’

Mechanical and chemical

How is the distressing process tackled in practice? There we need to draw a distinction between two things. On the one hand you have mechanical distressing, and on the other hand you have the chemical section, where the one can complement the other.

We’ve explained mechanical distressing at length in previous editions. We’ve clarified how there are two major objectives which you want to achieve with this operation: to create the impression that floorboards have been produced using old techniques and to imitate the effect that the wood has been used intensively. You achieve that effect with lashing, beating, or flogging.

We think it’s better this time to focus more on chemical distressing. With chemical products, you tackle both the appearance and colour of the wood.

Whitewashing and smoking

Parquet floors are often distressed by adapting the colour. To do that, professionals often adopt shades of white or grey by means of (intensive) whitewashing. What happens is that the floor is brushed first, and then a whitewash is carried out to yield a matt and chalky look. Darker shades are also popular and in that case we’re going to ‘smoke’ the surface, a common distressing technique with wood sorts containing a lot of tannic acid. What it boils down to is that you work towards a reaction from the tannic acid (tannic acid is founds a lot in our native oak, with the highest concentrations in European and American oak). A name which you’ve often heard is that of reactive stains. Remember, here, that this, too, is about provoking a reaction with the tannic acid in the wood, which creates a discolouration in the cell wall of the wood. Since this discolouration penetrates into the cell wall, it is highly intense and you get unique colours which are different with each piece of wood. Industrial distressing

How does the industry approach this? We asked a specialist, the French Blanchon Group. They explain: ‘In practice, we use various sorts of distressing. The industry doesn’t venture to use all wood sorts. Metal salts are used for staining, distressing agents in the form of so called positive stains, tinted oils, and so on. It’s important to say that some effects cannot be obtained on certain wood sorts. For instance, tropical wood sorts cannot cope with any white-based stain and the result will always be awful. Moreover, you can’t get certain effects on some wood sorts. For instance, it is not possible to get a stain on a white base and the seldom requested brightly coloured ranges ( e.g. red, green, and blue) tend to be obtained more on coniferous wood, where oak accounts for the vast majority of all trendy decors.’

Some other specialists have their say

Blanchon

Blanchon has two ranges of wood stains in watery phase for parquet floor fitters who finish parquet on site. One product is single-component and based on colouring agents, whilst the other is dual-component and based on pigments (excellent colour depth and remarkable resistance to UV). They also offer a range of distressing agents, which are reactive stains with a positive effect. These three series have a purely decorative purpose. Once products are stripped of what they had previously been processed with, they are covered with a sealer (usually ultra-matt, even invisible) or an oil with or without a shade, which can help to stress the distressed decoration even more. Blanchon also offers its industrial clients several colour solutions (and a great amount of know-how), whether a distressing effect is involved or not, where the use of very precise machines is required.

Bona

Bona subjects all products to strict tests to be sure that the products emit fewer or no volatile organic compounds (VOC) into the air. In addition, Bona is committed to healthy indoor air quality with innovations to products and machines. To give a parquet floor a distressed look, Bona has the specific ‘Brush Technology’ which highlights the natural character of the wood and gives existing wooden floors a new look. With the Bona Brush Technology, contra-rotating cylindrical brush heads brush the soft wood away so that the wood grain structure becomes more clearly visible and attractive effects are created. The possibilities are legion, from two-coloured contrasts to striking and modern dualcolour effects with the parquet oil and parquet lacquer from Bona. The Bona Brush Technology includes: the 1-disc sander Flexi Sand 1.9 equipped with the drive disc Bona Power Drive CONNECT. A steel brush set is mounted firstly to the Power Drive CONNECT (formerly NEB) for an initial brush passage. After that, a nylon brush set is fitted, which brushes away the soft wood between the hard wood to create depth and texture on the wooden surface. This ensures that the colour oil can soak into the grain to create the two-dimensional effect and improve the natural pattern of the wood.

Ciranova

Ciranova is the absolute market leader in reactive stains. Ciranova has various ranges such as Reactive stain, Reactive stain NT, Aquavintage and Vintage. Each Reactive stain has its own specific properties and applications. Since parquet fitters and manufacturers are always looking for novelties, Ciranova reactive stains offer a wide range of possible colours. The big advantage is that you can obtain highly natural distressed floors in combination with the water-based Ciranova finishes. You can also combine reactive stains with Ciranova colour oils to obtain unique finishes. Many parquet manufacturers worldwide are industrial spraying reactive stain and finishing with industrial products from the Ciranova range of industrial products. Onsite our reactive stain is used more frequently by the specialized professional. They are using a pressure sprayer to apply the reactive stain on the floor and for leveling afterwards. The floor can be finished with a Ciranova Hardwaxoil. For more information or for samples please contact Ciranova.

Chimiver

The use of OLD WEST allows to obtain a large variety of effects imitating the old weathered woods. OLD WEST is different from classical stains or dyes which are coloring the wood hiding its grain structure; OLD WEST enhances the natural beauty of wood standing out color differences into the wood grain. The OLD WEST reacting solutions are clear and pigments free; the natural wood color is changed through the reaction of the solution with the tannin or resins contained in the wood.