Staining your kitchen's shelves, wooden flooring, cabinets, and other furniture is a simple DIY project. But you may fail to get that perfect finish that you so much desire if you don't put in all the necessary detailed staining preparations. This post highlights seven of the top hacks and tricks in applying ultra-penetrating stains on wooden surfaces within your kitchen.
Here are tips that can help you to stain your kitchen's wooden surfaces and leave them shiny, smooth, and rich in color.
Select an Ideal Stain
Once your finish gets sealed and dried, you should choose wood stains, which match the final color that you'd wish to have on your surfaces. The stain you want should match the selected wooden surfaces in your kitchen. Such a choice will ensure the colors are cohesive, and you'll avoid having a mixture of dark and light shades.
Clean and Sand To Get a Smooth and Even Surface
A smooth and even surface makes the application of your stain easy, and it makes the surface more absorbent. But before the application of the stain, you have to sand the wooden surfaces lightly to make them more permeable. Your sanding should be done in the direction of the grain to avoid causing scratches on the wood.
After that, clean the surfaces with a moist cotton cloth to remove the sanding residue. But you should wait for the surface to dry up before you apply the stain.
Use Proper Staining or Painting Gear.
You should use appropriate disposable gloves and wear old clothing that will not mind staining. Ultra-penetrating stains can stain your skin, hair, and clothes with great ease. So, cover all areas of your body that may come in contact with your body before you start the staining process.
Use Paper Towels and Foam Brushes.
Instead of using a bristled painting brush to apply your ultra-penetrating stains onto the wooden surfaces, you should try a foam brush. These brushes are disposable because it's hard to get rid of the stain. If you need to wipe excess liquid stain that occurs between coats, then you can use a paper towel instead of cloth because these are disposable.
Flow with the Wood Grain
You should dip your foam brush into the staining solution and wipe it back and forth with the initial stroke being in the direction of the grain. In so doing, the stain solution that you're applying soaks well into the wooden surface, and the color of the surface will look natural. Unlike acrylic paints, stains dry up quick.
Apply More Than One Coats of Ultra-Penetrating Stains
Wood staining needs at least two coats to get a smooth finish. After applying the stain, you should wipe the wooden surface with a paper towel to remove any excess and wet stains. Then leave the surface to dry up.
You can then apply a second coat using the foam brush, and do so for any other successive layers till you achieve the finish and hue that you desire. You shouldn't add another layer before the extra coat has dried up well. Otherwise, the new stroke of stain will remove the preceding one.
Finish by Applying A Sealant
You should seal the wooden surfaces after your stain dries up to get a protected, deep, and glossy finish. Some stains have a polyurethane sealant, which gets incorporated into the self-sealing stain. But if you can't access such stains, then you should get some sealant.
Ultra-penetrating stains can provide your kitchen's wooden surfaces with a perfect finish. The sealant applied at the end of the process seals the stained layer and offers ideal protection that will ensure that your stained surfaces are perfect-looking. Before achieving this finish, you'll need to follow the steps outlined above to prepare the wooden surface for stain application.
At least 14% of homeowners had planned to do some kitchen refurbishment by 2018. If you're in the 14%, then consider wooden surface staining as one of the ways that you can improve the looks of your laundry room and kitchen's wood surfaces.