The day I met the English Polisher Rob Cain in his Grassington studio
Chapters in history are formed in every corner of Rob Cain’s studio workshop. The open pages of an antique ledger, enticing visitors to turn, adorn the countertop. A Victorian bird cage from Hungary occupies another area where a pair of ornate doors from India lean elegantly against the wall. These are just some of the souvenirs from Cain’s travels displayed not as keepsakes, but to be put back into purpose by customers who pop by his premises.
Advertisement
Hide AdAdvertisement
Hide AdIt is three years since Rob moved his established French polishing, repair and restoration business to his studio workshop in Grassington’s Main Street. The Old Polishing Shop is a shop window not only for Cain’s curios and collectables, it is also a place where he can pass on the heritage trade he learned from his father, through workshops and YouTube videos which have introduced his techniques to a global audience.
“We are a traditional French polishing family. Dad is the last of the time served guys,” says Rob. “He did an eight-year apprenticeship with William Nicholson in Leeds.”
His father eventually worked for himself and Cain recalls, as a child, accompanying him to his workshop in Rawdon. Back then his incentive was to earn some pocket money but, in doing so, the young scholar began to pick up the skills which would, ultimately, provide him with an enjoyable pastime and profession.
Advertisement
Hide AdAdvertisement
Hide Ad“I was taken in by the smells and the characters in the workshop. It was a feast for the senses. We laugh because I have probably done three times as long an apprenticeship as my dad – I am 46 now and I started when I was 14.”
Accompanying his father on polishing assignments introduced Cain to the stately homes and the beautiful furniture and woods within.
“A lot of old buildings still have a lot of old panelling, staircases, doors and floors – that is like the outfit of the building,” says Cain.
Advertisement
Hide AdAdvertisement
Hide AdCaring for and maintaining the professional craftsmanship requires skill and technique to ensure the history is preserved through the restoration. Working alongside his father, he recalls it became more than topping up his pocket money.
“The smell and the characters get under your skin and you think ‘this is alright.’ At some point it is not a job, you just want to get on with something. It is a very organic job because the polishes we use are natural things, linseed oil, some alcohol and Shellac.”
Preparation is imperative to the whole polishing process, he says. “For years you have to do preparation – it is the most important thing. Prepping furniture is getting something back to its basic form. You are stripping furniture and getting it back to its raw form. Once you prove you can prep you can start to put something on there, the oil, colour or stain or some polish and, on the way, you are picking up some basic repairs,” says Cain. Learning on the job he accumulated a wide skillset which he uses not only through polishing, repair and restoration, but also on the pieces of furniture he acquires at auction.
Advertisement
Hide AdAdvertisement
Hide Ad“There is always going to be something to challenge you because there are modern woods now and people are using modern finishes, but after five or six years you have got a basic understanding and, after 10 years, you understand about antiques and the furniture more and you start to understand about old mirrors and fabrics.”
Attending auctions provides a wealth of opportunity to find beautiful antique pieces which are ripe for repair and restoration. “For me it is nice because you can add value to anything,” he says.
Once revived, they can be passed on for others to enjoy – something Cain is continuing to do through his business which, he explains, evolved from working alongside his father who, he says proudly, is still polishing. “I started doing some YouTube videos. I would film myself restoring something so somebody would know how to do it.”
Advertisement
Hide AdAdvertisement
Hide AdThis led to an enquiry from a follower asking if he ran workshops – another element of his business which has organically grown.
He explains people can come along with a piece of their own furniture and learn how to restore it “They leave with a new skill and a piece of furniture restored.”
When me meet Cain was looking forward to repairing and polishing the doors at a church on the Holy Island in Northumberland. “I do church doors for free because dad’s first job, that I went with him on, was a church in Rawdon. I was just going to the church every day and helping him with the staining and polishing.”
Advertisement
Hide AdAdvertisement
Hide AdIt was following a trip to Greece where he spent the summer polishing that he began to advertise his skills in church magazines. “I was still using my dad’s workshop, tools and polishes,” he smiles. The YouTube videos followed and so did the opportunity to travel. Hungary, Holland and India are among the countries he has visited and where he sourced many acquisitions.
Over the years his collections have caught the eye of TV production companies. Some of his stock has been used as props, and Rob has also appeared on the small screen taking part in programmes including Channel Four’s Antiques Hunters which took him treasure hunting to France. “I did it to make my dad proud because he knows what he has put into me has come round. That is why I teach it through my YouTube videos.” It is Cain’s way of giving back for the time invested in him by his father, and also keeping the trade alive for those who passed on their skills to his father. “It is massively important to keep heritage trades alive.”
Taking an Edwardian chair, Cain demonstrates some of the techniques of French Polishing which date back to 250AD.
Advertisement
Hide AdAdvertisement
Hide Ad“You are prepping it back, feeding the wood with oil and adding the Shellac on top which is the French polishing and you are putting that on with a Fad, a very old cloth – wool wrapped in cotton – it used to be sheep wool, like cashmere, wrapped in muslin.” Although a popular nail polish, there is a sustainable aspect to the use of Shellac, when used to polish furniture it is effectively putting the sap back on the tree. Similarly, polishing, repairing and restoring old furniture is recycling – bringing precious and treasured pieces back to life.
“All these fab old pieces of furniture have lasted 500 years. They have been made in different styles from trees in woodland in England you cannot chop down any more, and they have a story attached to a time in history,” says Cain Etched with grooves and wear marks, these tracks of their life could tell a fascinating tale. “In bureaus how many letters have been written and what did they want to say? All these beautiful things are made by proper craftsmen. It is such an organic trade. There is so much of this furniture about,” says Cain, referring to the longevity in the pieces that have survived hundreds of years and can still sit beside, and have a place, among modern equivalents. “A lot of people ask what is the most successful thing you have bought or sold and it is a weird one because you become more sentimental about an era or a time. You are on a journey and it is therapeutic. As you are rubbing things back you are revealing the honesty and the story of what that piece of furniture is. You are putting your mark and finish on that.”
www.englishpolisher.co.uk