At Maine Steamer Trunk Company we use a technique that is now considered very rare for professional restorers called Hand Stripping. The technique involves applying a thick finish remover onto a piece, section at a time and scraping off the finish by hand. Oftentimes the process has to be repeated until none of the old finish is visible. The piece is then cleaned up by hand using a cloth and acetone. We never use water in our stripping process to protect those spots on furniture which are made of composite wood materials. which swell when in contact with water and we are in most cases able to strip around an upholstered piece. Overall we find the hand stripping technique more versatile that other industry stripping systems.