Rust Patina for the Deck Railing & Fire Starts

Randall and I built the deck on the house last summer and a year later the railing is nothing more than sections of 2x4 nailed from post to post.  We've had a year to think about it.  When sitting on the deck, a major component of the view is the cottonwoods which are low down, so a major design goal for the railing was that it block the view as little as possible.  We looked at wire railings which are held by turnbuckles, but they seemed a bit too modern with respect to the rest of the house.  We'd pretty much decided that a plain metal railing would be best.  Another design goal for the railing was to have them match the rusted roof if possible. Ideally this meant a rust patina, but we also thought of finishing it with paint.  Building a rust patina was an experiment that turned out pretty well.

Contro II, Gerald DiGuisto, 1978

As an undergraduate in college I studied with the sculptor Gerald DiGuisto. Gerry was  trained at the Boston Museum School and at Yale. He was a perfectionist regarding every aspect of his work. This perfectionism included the process of constructing the subtly nuanced layers of rust patina on his work.  It was pure alchemy and his formulas were guarded secrets. Memories of Gerry griped me as I tried to figure out a formula for rusting the new railings.


The metal railings were welded up in Fort Collins by Randall's friend Rick at Flash Portable Welding. Once we had selected the plain 1/4" bar stock we left the details of the spacing of up to Randall and Rick.  As soon as I saw them I knew they were perfect.   There is plenty of information on the web about rusting metal.  We ended up with the following process:

1. Degrease at the car wash using engine cleaner.
2. Sprayed with muratic acid (diluted 3 cups acid/ gallon of water)
3. Sprayed with  1/4 cup salt, 1/4 cup vinegar, 1 pint Hydrogen Peroxide

I got impatient and repeated steps 2 and 3 all in the same day. I have no idea what Gerry did to achive such beautiful patinas on his work.

By the end of the day we had a nice rust patina on the railings. Unfortunately, this was also the day we first saw smoke from what became the Squirrel Creek Fire.

After working on hte railings all day, I loaded up one car with important papers and valuables and drove it to town. Friends there drove me back out to the house with a horse trailer in tow and we loaded a number of large pieces of furniture for them to take back to town.