2nd and 3rd Floor Hallway
Stenciling and Refinishing

"The unholy decorators have not yet begun their depredations, and Mrs. Clemens is in despair..."
Sam Clemens to Edward House, Hartford, October 21, 1881

The distinctive stencils throughout the hallways on the second and third floors of The Mark Twain House are another feature of the Louis Comfort Tiffany interior decoration of 1881.

The normal wear on the stenciling, which was refinished during the original restoration of the house in the 1960s, necessitated a re-stenciling in 2003-2004, as well as the touch-up of the decorative painting and the refinishing of woodwork.

Master stencil artist Leo Sans, a German-born painter who was trained in traditional painting and stenciling methods more than half a century ago, worked on the original restoration in the 1960s. In 2003, he returned to The Mark Twain House with his son, Matt, to restore the luster to the hallway stencils and woodwork.

The goal of the project is to document, restore, recreate and preserve the original Tiffany-designed stencils. Painters reproduced the wall and ceiling stenciling that Mark Twain and his family enjoyed in the 1880s.

The stenciling process consists of the following steps

• Before applying anything to the walls, workers first assessed the conditions of the wall and ceiling surfaces and made any needed repairs.
• A vinyl lining was applied over the surface to hide small plaster blemishes and to protect earlier, historical wall treatments.
• Once the stencil pattern and field colors have been painted onto the lining, it is applied to the wall and adhered using vinyl paste.
• The vinyl canvas upon which they applied the paint and stencil patterns protects the original stenciling by covering it over.

During the Clemenses' tenure in the house, the painters applied the stenciling directly to the plaster walls. The methods used in The Mark Twain House today are largely the same as those used historically. Most of the change has come in the materials. The stencils today are made of a stiffened wax paper, which repels paint and prevents the patterns from tearing. To prevent paint from bleeding through the patterns, stencilers primed the patterns by applying several practice coats, creating a thick, protective layer of paint. Historically, stencilers used tin, hard paper, or leather with oil or animal fat to repel the paint. According to conservator Brian Powell, when The Mark Twain House was decorated in the 1880s, the paints would have consisted of lead and oil paint bound with a boiled linseed oil. To prevent shredding of stencil patterns, the stencilers preferred paste oil colors, without lead, over the more commercially available paints. For the stencil patterns in the Drawing Room, a mixture of silver bronzing powder and bronzing liquid was used. The field colors on the vinyl lining is latex paint.

Colors of Stencils: Gold, Bronze, Green

The colors of the painted and stenciled canvas applied to the walls had become particularly faded in the 3rd floor hallway. The stencil patterns there originally (both in the Clemens period and after the 1970s restoration) were gold bronze, appearing gold in color.

The original appears dark green over the lighter green field earlier stencil pattern colors now appear bronze due to fading caused by the sun. Both colors started out looking gold.

During the first restoration, the researchers replicated the 1880s paint colors by removing a sample and having it analyzed. Matt and Leo Sans created the paint from that analysis, as well as from input from others involved in the restoration.

Wood Finish

For the wood finish, the period finish discovered during the original 1960s-era restoration was duplicated. However, in order to apply a new finish to the wood, the restoration committee at the time decided they had to strip the original material, leaving little evidence for future reference.
The finishes in use today are different than those used by craftsmen in the 1870s and 1880s. Then, they had their own formulas and applied shellac, a brittle material that was sufficient for use in a home but not strong enough to stand up to the more than 60,000 visitors coming through The Mark Twain House. Also, the existing conditions of the wood, such as bleaching from sunlight, make it impossible to bring out the same luster that was present when the Clemenses lived in the house.