So, I put about a brazilian hours of sanding into her, but stumble on good fortune...
Once I'd done all the edges and the flat spots in the middle, it really looked chiseled. So I decided to hit it with some stain and see what happened. Stain always brings out the worst in a piece, so it made sense.
It worked out great. It got 2 coats of stain, and it was sheer hell to get all the stain out of where it wasn't supposed to be.
But once again, I got lucky. It looked exactly the way it should look. It ended up with exactly the feel I was looking for.
I put a couple coats of gloss poly on it and a few coats of satin poly. High gloss poly fills voids really well and "builds" thickness. Satin poly does not. So whenever a piece is going to get a satin finish, I bring it up with gloss and finish coat with satin.
Same look, far better results.
I just made tabs to hold the mirror in. I need to get back to that.
I also ordered a diamond drag knife so I can etch the glass. No idea what I'll do yet. At the minimum, I'll do Weeze's initials in script.
These pics are after stain, before poly.
When it's all done, I'll post finished pics.
