If you want to make a picture frame that has the look of being old, you will be able to make it fairly easily.
Even thought you frame will be just made, it will look like an antique.
Simple steps and the right supplies is all you need.
Barn wood that has been out in the weather for decades makes a good-looking picture frame.
The only problem with using already aged wood is the cut points.
When you cut the wood to the size that you want it to be, you will have a miss match in color.
Sometimes this is not really a bad thing.
If it is the look that you are going for, it will work.
However, if you want all the surfaces to match, a way around this is to place your cuts only in the areas that do not show.
With a picture frame, you would make all of your width cuts placed on the inside if the picture frame.
The edge cuts or miter cuts would have to be very accurate so that none of the cut surfaces will show.
When using old barn wood we would have very little fresh cut surfaces showing.
Providing you lay out your cuts right.
However, you may have a lot more scrap than using new wood.
If you needed to, you can stain the fresh cuts to match the original surface as close as you can.
If the stain does not match too well it still would not show up that much.
But you could stain the whole frame and not have to worry about your cuts.
Using new wood will eliminate this miss match color problem.
Furthermore, you will be able to better use your wood without as much scrap.
You just make your frame as you would if you were making a modern style picture frame.
To make it look old, you can now beat it up a little to make some marks in the wood.
Also dent some of the outside edges to show use.
This process is known as distressed wood.
When you sand your frame, sand out the fine scratches and leave the deeper ones.
Even if you leave some of the smaller ones it will still look good.
However, too much will look bad.
To get the feel for this process, take a scrap piece of the same wood that you made your frame from and scratch and dent it.
Go ahead and finish it like you want your frame to look and see what effect that you get.
Once you are happy with your results, just do the same thing to your frame.