Help wanted to restore small, black (japanned?) note box

I recently inherited this old note box from my Pop that he always used to keep next to the phone. It has seen some years.
Despite the pattern and japanned (?) finish, the wood is mdf, so I don’t expect this to be of high value but I would like to restore it anyway. It holds a wealth of memories and as a father of 4 (3 girls) I am sure one of them would be keen to have it in time.
I am not sure where to begin though. I am repairing the inserts that fit the box, they are thin 3-ply wedges and that is fairly straightforward but for the outside, I want to;
1. Repair the hinge mechanism
2. Repair the locking plate
3. Restore the finish
I had thought of making a feature out of the repair to the hinges by reinserting the hinge plates into the box and covering them up with an ornate cut piece of jarrah but I don’t think that would look so good.
I think I want to restore it so it looks consistently black but I am unsure of how to repair mdf, what the finish is and how to make it look good again.
If anyone has any suggestions, I would welcome as much info on this as I can.
Thank you
Nick
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If it is a true Japanese lacquer box the finish would be Urushi aka lacquerware.
Urushi is the sap of a plant related to Poison Oak and has the same allergic and highly irritating properties.
It dries via exposure to humidity. I have used a red Urushi on bamboo shakuhachis.
I'm sure there are more pleasant and easy to use equivalents but I don't know what they are.

Looks more like decoupage to me

Hi Nick .

Its not MDF although it does look very similar . Its a Victorian Papier Mache Box . The sort of thing that shows up as tables , Trays , Writing boxes and a lot more probably . Some of it is very nice ,and highly regarded. You will see in the links I have just looked up . Plenty of it needs work because of neglect and its brittle nature . I found what looks to be a very good link on it as well . I"m going back to have a good read of that .

I have worked on a bit of it over the years. People would bring it in for repair to my Fathers Antique business or we bought and sold some nice examples and they sometimes needed work . We just used to glue back what was loose , fill what was missing and touch up using shellac stained black, then more with thick shellac stained Black . Finished with a light coat of clear shellac and a rubber then possibly a wax to give the perfect shine . The repairs where bits were missing had the thick Black shellac applied , where you have nice original finish remaining it just needs a light wash and a thin revive with very thin shellac and wax. You need to be careful not to remove the lightly applied colours which would be sealed in with thin shellac originally.

This link looks great.
https://www.si.edu/mci/downloads/REL...pier_mache.pdf

Boxes
https://www.google.com/search?q=Vict...w=1344&bih=686


And some nice ones in here.
https://www.google.com/search?q=Vict...w=1344&bih=686


Rob

That is excellent thank you guys.
Great links too Rob! Thank you very much. I will cautiously proceed as you suggest, it looks like someone before me has bogged the back of the top hinges exactly as you suggest...


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Thought this might be of interest for cleaning https://www.theurbanvintageaffair.co...iques/page_303