Still working on Schoenhut dolls....

This doll came with her brother to get a cleaning and few touchups.

She really isn't in too bad shape but she will get a bit of work done on her mouth.

She has some odd wood issues on her body.

Here is one shoulder.

Here is one hip.

It looks like some previous wood damge has been addressed by some sort of filler that did not do well with time?

These areas are dry and stable. They can be covered easily by clothes so they will not be touched.

This leg could use a good cleaning!

After a cleaning she is minus a lot of grime.

She lost the crumbling, yellowed varnish on her torso in the process.

 

Yet another Schoenhut doll

 

Here is a 14" carved hair girl.

She has been thickly repainted in the past. Her current owner has already removed one layer of overpaint from her head.

This was her face when her owner received her.

You can see how thick the overpaint once was. And, it was painted right over a taped up leg fracture.

Her face upon arrival here.....hmmm, I think there is another layer of overpaint that can come off.

Here most of her overpaint has been removed. The red on her mouth is still to come off. It is covering the original colour which is pinker.

Off comes the thick overpaint on her body.

That shows more details of her broken leg and it's previous repair.

Under the tape I find string has been wound around the leg.

It is not a pretty sight!

The old fracture lines have to be cleaned off before I try to reassemble the bits.

This repair is going to need a wood epoxy. There is a lot of tension on the wood from all the springs making up the joints and these bits will not fit together tightly enough to use a PVA carpenter's glue.

After cleaning off more overpaint and old glue, the leg can be put back together.

A bit of sanding and paint, then the leg can be reattached.

This is mostly her original paint.

She has had a few touchups on the left side where the paint was missing and she also had some refreshing of her eye and mouth paint.

And another Schoenhut doll.

 

This is a #313 Schoenhut, characterized by smooth, non-intaglio eyes.

He has had some work done previously but it is not adding to his appeal.

A red coloured filler has been used and does not seem to have been smoothed too well.

He has lots of touch up paint on his face.

One lower leg has split and is held together by tape.

He needs to get the old repaint and filler off.

Here he is with that done.

Under part of the filleron his forehead is some wood that is soft. A wood hardener will be used on that before sealing and filling his dings.

The old tape is removed from his lower leg and it is detached for easier gluing/clamping.

After applying some good carpenter's glue and some clamping, the dirty piece of tape is history.

After a bit of filling and some touch up paint he is looking more respectable?

A sad Schoenhut doll

 

This is a lovely 16" carved hair girl who has arrived with some of her siblings to get improved upon.

She has been repainted in the past and the repaint is failing.....cracking and flaking off. Parts of her original paint has failed too as you can see bare wood in spots.

You can also see that she once had blue eyes.

The brown paint on her left eye is flaking off a bit revealing a previous paint layer.

On the back of her head you can see bits of original hair colour wher the overpaint has flaked off.

The overpaint looks....moldy?

Off comes a layer of paint.....only to reveal another layer of stuff over the original paint. This stuff is hard like gesso but also needs to come off as it is failing quite badly.

It is a slow go to scrape the gesso remnants off.

Here you can see original paint emerging in the hair. 

Unfortunately there is not much, if any original paint left on the face and neck. The pink is still the gesso layer that is warping, cracking and flaking off.

A full blue eye has emerged from under the brown eyes she arrived with.

But, as the gesso comes off, there are brown eyes under the blue.

And, under those brown eyes, are blue eyes again!

This doll has had the colour of her eyes changed 3 times. Each layer of paint plus the gesso filled in what were once deep intaglio eyes.

This picture may look pretty scary but in a different light.....

Look at the depth of those eyes!

Even the modelling of her mouth is becoming more defined as the layers come off.

Here she is with all the non original layers removed.

The only bits of original paint left are a few patches of hair.

New paint done.

Her body had a respectable abount of original paint left under the moldy looking overpaint.