Finishing advice for kitchen cabinets

Well with lacquer your woods will change color a little bit, you cherry should yellow a bit more and walnut darken a shave, so I”m not sure you really need to stain this.

-- The mark of a good carpenter is not how few mistakes he makes, but rather how well he fixes them.

To accentuate contrast, an oil is your best route, IMO. I’d use Danish oil or an oil-based finish like Waterlox. I would follow that with something like General Finishes Endurovar (a water-borne poly finish that looks like oil-based poly) for a good film protection. I would use a thin coat of dewaxed shellac (Zinsser Sealcoat) to bridge between the oil and the film finish.

Nobody says you have to use lacquer, though if you are able to spray your finish it’s not that big of a deal. As TCC mentioned, lacquer alone will give a nice look too. But the aforementioned GF Endurovar has many of the same qualities as a lacquer anyway and it can be applied anyway you like.

This is a real trouble free way of finishing, especially on the cherry. You are asking for trouble staining cherry…and it appears to me that you don’t need it. The oils will likely give it the “tan” that you need anyway. The GF Endurovar also will give more of an amber look than typical water-borne finishes.

As always, use a test strip (put scrap walnut and cherry boards side-by-side) and give these a try. I bet you’ll like the look.

-- jay, www.allaboutastro.com

Why stain woods that are beautiful as they are? Any clear finish will darken a bit, and will bring out the colors of the wood. After my recent post on another thread, looks like I’m on a (mostly) lonely crusade against staining everything whether it needs it or not (Or a jihad, if you’re Muslim.

Funny, I never thought of myself as an infidel wood stainer! lol I’ll do some test strips from cutting excess off of the drawer faces before I stain. If it cleans up the look and brings out the contrast then I’m with you guys…why stain at all? We’ll see how it looks. Thanks for sharing.

-- Mark ~ Dixon, Kentucky "We're gonna get through this!"