Nitty Gritty Furniture Design and Restoration

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Our History

THE OLD DAYS...Starting as a fine furniture stripping and restoration business in 1974, Nitty Gritty quickly became known as the top restoration house in Toronto.  Contract work with the R.O.M. and some of the best antique dealers in the city earned Nitty Gritty the respect, and reputation of focussed attention to detail.  

Part of the work for the Museum required historical Milk Paint, which we sourced, help develop and now distribute across the country under the brand, Canadian Old Fashioned Milk Paint Company ©.  The business continued to expand into another niche as Carousel Restoration was added to the fold in the late 1970’s.

As time passed, we utilized our restoration expertise in the addition of fine cabinetry work, to compliment our spectacular finishes.  Behind the scenes we continued to restore antiques and other furnishings as a service to individual clients.

In the early 1980’s we developed a furniture line of 60 pieces named, Our Painted Past Country Furniture©.  That line evolved and broadened to over 400 SKU’s by the early 1990’s, all the while responding to custom and made-to-measure requests.  Our environmental awareness, early in the 90’s, brought us further into water-based finishes. We continue to specialize in water-based products, as they continue to develop and improve.  In the early 1990’s, we created another line of licensed furniture modelled after Anne of Green Gables.  We experimented with the Japanese and American markets, then developed our own water-based finishes.

Late in the 90’s, Chapter’s Book Stores was rolling out their huge expansion across the country. They came to us to help solve problems with their showroom furniture supplier who had poor quality in both the cabinetry and finishing, and furthermore couldn’t meet production time lines.  We re-engineered the products, and ended up supplying over 2500 pieces of furniture, on time and above the quality expectations set by Chapter’s.  Today, we still build some of those original OPP pieces from time to time, and still produce fine contract furniture. However much of our energy is devoted to our fine cabinetry and restoration.  We would love to help you, too?

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2222216 Ontario Inc.

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