38 March 2022
BY KIM HAST Y | PHOTOGRAPHY BY CINDY BURNHAM
Good as new
FEATURE
H
ere in a red metal building
off the beaten path in
Stedman, with the faint
smell of sawdust and
varnish lingering in the air,
people hand off their family heirlooms and
then hope against hope for the improbable.
Scratched, chipped and with missing
legs here and there, one treasured memory
or another is always on the operating
table at Cynthia Saar's business, Cardinal
Restorations LLC.
Saar just about always comes through.
e results of her meticulous work –
polished, painted, stained – have been
known to move her customers to tears.
"I live for that," Saar said.
Her toughest customer was her first one.
Saar was a teenager growing up in Berkley,
California, when her mother, Arlene,
handed her a piece of antique furniture and
instructed her to repair it. "Mom," she said.
"I don't know anything about this."
But in her hard-working family of eight
"From stripping furniture,
repair and fabrication and
replacement of damaged
parts to veneer and inlay
work, staining and finishing,
we do it all."
– Cynthia Saar
Cynthia Saar and partner Ann Faircloth
