Historic Paint Layer Uncovered

In the midst of ongoing preservation work on interior shutters at President Lincoln’s Cottage this winter, our Preservation Manager, Jeff Larry, uncovered a layer of blue paint. This layer of blue paint was identified elsewhere in the Cottage during previous paint and finish analyses and may date to the Lincoln era. Finding this paint layer in yet another section of the Cottage increases our chances of eventually determining whether this particular layer was visible during Lincoln’s time. Previous rounds of professional, comprehensive paint and finish analysis done in the 1980s and in the 2000s could not concretely pinpoint when the blue paint layer appeared in the Cottage.

Below, is a photo from our Instagram account of the shutter Jeff uncovered the paint on. You can follow us on Instagram at @LincolnsCottage to see our preservation updates as they happen.

Efforts to preserve the Cottage, as demonstrated here, are ongoing and continue turning up new surprises. Support our preservation of the Cottage by making a donation today.

Our Preservation Manager was intrigued by the early layer of blue paint he found while working on the interior shutters of the Cottage.
Here’s an explanation for what you’re looking at: Paint layers were carefully scraped back over a small area to expose the blue paint. Just below the blue layer are 3+ layers of white paint with the base layer coming from 1842. The base layer is followed by a strip of wood substrate. Besides the coolness of seeing all the layers at once it may give us more clues into the Lincoln era finishes. #preservation #historicpreservation #restoration #paint

A photo posted by President Lincoln’s Cottage (@lincolnscottage) on Feb 18, 2016 at 9:58am PST

February 19, 2016

Categories:Archive, Preservation

Tags:e-newsletter, Newsletter (Feb 2016)

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