Neat Lac Sheridan Question

[cjnthumper]

I have my neat lac and have been doing a lot of sheridan carving. I have been using a tiny paint brush to paint the flowers so when i apply the paste antique it only changes the color of the background. however, after reading some posts it appears that the neat lac should be rubbed into the whole piece. do you rub it into the pieces of leather that are not carved too? I mainly do bible covers and guitar straps and wonder if the whole piece of leather should be neat lac'd. also it seams when its applied that it blocks (resists) the antique color, so if you apply neat lac to the whole piece do you just have to keep rubbing and rubbing in the antique to get some color?

[Tkleather1]

I use it on the entire project. Then when you use the antique it will slightly get through on top but where the leather is mashed down by your tooling it will settle in and give a nice contrast in color. I apply my Wyoshene using a trimmed woolskin scrap.

Tim Worley

TK-Leather

[King's X]

You can do both, as well as, how you are doing it. Just depends where you want your antique paste to concentrate on. I use a cheap toothbrush to get my paste where I want it to concentrate. i used to rub the paste all over, but I found if you have a scratch on the non-tooled leather, your paste will find it even with neat lac covering it.

good question!

[cjnthumper]

good advice. I guess where I am getting confused is that if I neat lac the entire project that the leather will not change color where it is not tooled and stay a very light veg tanned color. can you explain the process in which you did that guitar pick guard? it may help me understand.

[electrathon]

When I do it I neat-laq eveything. One coat applied with a piece of sheepskin scrap. Then I antique over all of the tooling, it makes a mess. Wipe away everything on the surface, leaving the cuts and dents in the leather colored. Allow to dry for a bit and then wipe the piece down with tan-coat to seal in the antique.

Aaron