In our furniture repair business, one of the highest honours is working on historic furniture. We've had the pleasure of working at Trafalgar Castle, which was the largest castle and private residence in Canada from 1859 to 1914. In 2023, the staff at Trafalgar Castle had us restore a historic table (circa 1850), which we featured in a two-part video series on our Fixing Furniture YouTube channel. Then in 2024, they reached out and asked us to restore 8 chairs from the castle that were of the same era. These can be seen in another YouTube video below.

Historic Table Restoration

Working on historic furniture requires attention to detail, patience, and years of experience to ensure it isn't damaged in the process. The table we restored is in photos with the original owner of Trafalgar Castle. The facilities staff believe it was brought over from England when the Castle was built in 1859. The wood is English Oak, so that aligns with these details. The finish on the table was in good shape but the structure of the table base needed a lot of repair. The scrollwork on the table base was split in some places and it had pieces missing that had to be remade and stained to disguise the repair work. 

During the table restoration, I discovered some wood shavings in the table base column, which I suspect would have been from the original craftsman some time around 1850 in England. Wow, what a find! I kept some in the table base to retain that history and I put a few shavings in a display case for the Trafalgar Castle staff to put on display when they host tours.

The wheel cups on the base were also damaged, which required turning new pieces on the lathe to patch the wood. I cut the original cups and glued on the new parts before sanding, staining, and finishing them to match the table. This table was a challenging project and we're proud to have saved this important piece of furniture for the Castle.

We also had the privilege of filming both the outside and the inside of Trafalgar Castle to show the beautiful architecture and furnishings. In the two-part video series, the exterior is shown in the first video and the exquisite interior of Trafalgar Castle is featured in the second video. We were featured in our local Brooklin Town Crier newspaper in 2024, when an article about our YouTube channel was written. The editor, Richard Bercuson, watched the Trafalgar Castle videos and wrote "In the last ten minutes of Part 2, Bennett takes viewers on a guided tour of the building. That bit alone explains why the Brooklin furniture restorer's videos currently have 112,000 subscribers."

Trafalgar Castle is now run as a private girl's school. Here is the historic plaque at the entrance of the school.

Historic Chair Restoration

The set of 8 chairs from Trafalgar Castle were from the same era as the table. The original owner of the Castle, Nelson Gilbert Reynolds (Sheriff of Ontario County), was photographed with these chairs between 1859 and 1862. When the chairs came into our workshop, they needed to be stripped of the upholstery to reglue the loose joints. As you can see in the video, removing this upholstery was a very messy and dirty job. There was also some decorative trim missing. This required reproducing the detail with a mix of hand tools and machines. After sanding the parts smooth, I mitred the joints and attached the trim so all the chairs looked the same once again. I stained and finished the trim to match each chair as each was a slightly different colour from previous refinishing work.

We film these projects as examples of how furniture is repaired. I'm passionate about teaching these skills to the next generation as many of the people I know in this industry are retiring from the craft. If you're interested in learning how to repair furniture, take a look at our furniture repair courses and our Fixing Furniture Community.

Author: Scott Bennett, Co-owner, Wooden It Be Nice - Furniture Repair