project: aging wood

I have a shoot coming up that I need some aged wood and have been exploring online some things I've seen recently. My buddy from my AT days Jonathan Lo just finished a headboard with a vinegar technique so I asked him a couple questions and ran off to Home Depot to see what I could come up with.

So I got home last night armed with Minwax grey stain and white wash products [awesome], vinegar, steel wool and a spray bottle [$.99 cent store] and lastly Martha Stewart's Paintable Crackle Finish.

Now with the shoot I have some specific things we're trying to do to enhance the product so I think some of these results will work best for that project, but I can't help but let my pea brain swirl around the idea of what else can be achieved with some discoveries.

wood used: Poplar [precut at Home Depot and mostly sanded too] [images top to bottom] top board - steel wool scraped board with vinegar and then pulled apart steel wool and sprayed again with vinegar and left over night to rust. [Notice steel wool pulled and left on top of board] second board - steel wool scraped with vinegar, minor particles of the steel wool fell off to create a light rusting effect third board - split in two sides [left side] white wash first, grey wash over the top applied with rag. [right side] white wash first, second application crackle paint [applied grey stain later see photo below] fourth board - [left side] grey stain first, white wash second both applied with rag. [right side] grey stain on it's own

finished results [left to right] rusted steel wool with vinegar overnight, grey wash solo, white wash with crackle product and grey wash over top, plain poplar board with vinegar scrub down.

Side note: the rusted piece with steel wool will need to be sealed with a product if you wish to use it in a home setting, the rust comes off on your hands very easily. This was achieved overnight [less than 24 hrs]