Archibald Sliman, Cumnock, 1837-50

An 8 day, 2 weight longcase clock with anchor escamement, made by Archibald Sliman between 1837-1850. I've only really lightly cleaned this dial and re-inked the numbers, but I thought I'd post it because it has an interesting layered look after various restoration jobs. I think that the painting at the top is original, but the corner paintings have been added at a later date (the rose and foliage is quite poorly done in comparison to the top), along with the maroon decoration around the edges. These areas have subsequently been painted with an ageing varnish, but for some reason they've chosen to keep the dial area free from varnish. The central area has been covered with gold leaf and then varnished also. I wonder if this is a relatively modern restoration job, gold leaf used like this is a new fashion, I wonder what they were covering underneath?

Winstanley, Beaumaris. c1830.

An 8 day longcase clock dial dating from about 1830. There is a clock recorded in Iorweth C. Peate's 'Clock and Watch Makers of Wales' made by John Winstanley of Beaumaris in 1820, probably the same maker, but this style of clock is a little later. As you can see from the before and after pictures it's had a light clean, the figures, signature, globes, numbers on the date wheel, seconds indicator and circles have been re-inked, and the faded gold has been re-painted. The disc indicating the moons fazes has been very lightly cleaned.

Stokes of Bewdley Painted Dial

This is a painted dial from a 30hr Longcase clock dating from 1740/50 which I restored in January 2008. I cleaned the dial lightly, removing dirt from the scratches and revealing the true colours. The first image shows the dial half way through cleaning, and as you can see the cleaning has made the remains of the signature visible.





After the cleaning stage I re-touched any bad areas of damage; re-blacked the numbers and replaced the signature following the original lines exactly; and finally re-painted the goldwork. The second image shows the finished dial, cleaned and repaired.