Distressed wood finishing: How to make new look old (part 1)
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When done right distressed wood finishing will result in a finished piece that people will think is decades old, when in fact it is a newly finished piece. At first it may seem like distressed finishing is too complicated or takes too long. Nothing could be further from the truth. The process is broken down into six straight forward steps.
This technique works well with solid wood furniture. However, I don’t recommend attempting to apply this technique to pieces made from plywood or any type of laminate pieces. The veneer is too thin and will most likely break off and really look bad.
For this article we will be refinishing a raised panel cabinet door.
Step 1: Distressing
It may seem odd to take a newly built door and beat it up. This step involves applying some ‘damage’ or wear and tear to the outside of the furniture. Over time a door that is used on a regular basis gets worn, such as the edges are no longer crisp, dings and knicks in the wood.
Here are some distressing methods that you can apply to the door:
- Use 180 grit sand paper in a palm or random orbital sander. Round over and dull the sharp edges.
- Add knicks and dings by striking the surface with an old pad lock. You can also use any other metal object that has pronounced edges and some weight to it.
- Add worm holes and knife cuts
Step 2: Apply the base color
The type of stain that will be used is a spray on dye stain. Instead of spraying it, we will be wiping it on to produce our desired effect. Select three colors of dye stain a yellow, a red and a brown. Also pick up a clear dye stain.
Smudge the yellow dye stain over selected areas of the door. Apply it kind of randomly. Don’t apply the stain in only one section of the door. Apply some of the yellow dye stain to the rails, stiles and parts of the panel.
Now take the red dye stain and smudge it over random areas of the door. Mostly apply it to areas that do not have any stain it. Smudge the red dye stain over some of the yellow stained areas as well.
Taking the brown dye stain smudge it over the remaining unfinished areas and also smudge it over some of the red and yellow stained areas.
As the final part of the staining step, apply the clear dye stain to wash and blend the stains on the door. Wipe the clear dye stain over the entire door’s surface. At the completion of this step the door will have a fairly even stain that has areas where the stain is a bit more yellow, red or brown.
In the next part of this series will complete the steps in distressed wood finishing technique.
To continue reading Distressed wood finishing: How to make new look old (part 2)
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Comments
I have some handsome new solid mahogany doors, but the carpenter couldnt finish them. I want a slightly distressed look, so they seem as though they’ve been around 150 years (the age of my house).
Two questions: do you put a sealer on only after distressing and staining? And why do you use three stains? Since I like the reddish tone of the doors, I don’t want to add much color beyond what I need to make them look old. Any suggestions?
Hey Jim,
Mahogany is a lovely wood, isn’t. I am in the middle of a project building a dresser bed (storage bed) for my daughter. All of the exterior pieces are solid mahogany.
One of these days I will post the plans and some pictures of the project.
Ok, I digress, back to your questions.
Question #1:
Yes, it is important that you stain the wood first to the color of your liking BEFORE sealing it. Once the sealer is on the wood, the wood will no longer accept stain. Unless you strip the sealer off.
Question #2:
The reason for the blend of three colors is to give the finished piece an aged old look. Over time the original finish will discolor but not evenly there will be lighter and darker areas.
First off, did the carpenter leave you any scrape mahogany wood? If so, practice the technique and the stain colors on it before working on the doors.
If not… this going to make it a bit more difficult. You can work on the technique with any solid lumber, but the issue is getting the right blend of stain colors to give you the desired result. For that, you need to have access to some scrape pieces. They don’t have to be very large pieces, 8 inch square or larger would be ideal.
Another option would be to contact the carpenter and ask for a couple of scrapes. Or offer to buy them from him.
Good luck with your finishing project. Let me know how it turns out.
Thanks, Toni. That is very helpful. The reason I asked about the three colors is this. I like the reddish tone of the mahogany, so I don’t want to darken it much overall. I really want the stain to darken the corners and distressed spots, but not much on the rest. I had been thinking of something like a golden oak for this. Won’t applying three stains darken the entire door a lot more?
Jim
Now, I see were the confusion is.
The three stains are applied on sections of the door not the entire door. So, taking one of the stains apply it to parts of the door say in the corners and a little bit going down one side. Then take the next stain and apply it to areas that have not been stained. In the process overlap with the area that was stained with the first stain.
The idea here is to apply the stains to different sections of the door with some overlapping of the stains.
With the mahogany using two stains a medium and light stains should turn out nicely. Especially with the dark wood as base.
Toni
Thanks! Again, that is helpful. Any sealer you’d especially recommend for a dense wood like mahogany?
And for the exterior door, I was going to use two coats of marine varnish. Does that sound right? It gets a few hours of sun a day and we have no storm door.
Jim
Yes. For exterior wooden doors definitely a high quality marine varnish. There are different grades of marine varnish. For an exterior door I would use marine varnish designed to protect the hull of a wooden boat. Ask you local marine / boating supply store. They should carry it or be able to refer you to a company that sells it.
It won’t be cheap, but then again, this is a lovely set of doors that you want to look great for many years.
My in-laws purchased a new home about six years ago that came with a solid wood house door. It was nice door but… the varnish the builder put on it was crap. Within three years the varnish was pealing and flaking off. Then the door started to develop a couple of deep cracks.
So, the moral of the story is, for exterior doors use the best grade of marine varnish you can find.
On the inside of the door I have used Minwax® water based polyurethane varnish and have loved it. Last year I built a platform storage bed for my eldest daughter out of solid mahogany and sealed it with this varnish. The finish has held up very well.
It dries well and produces a tough coating.
I have also used it on my kitchen cabinets. About five years ago I started a two year project to replace all of the kitchen cabinets with my custom built units. You know how much wear and tear kitchen cabinets get and the varnish has held up beautifully.
Toni
i am making a chalis and i am using a peice of dried cherry log it already has a bunch of worm marks and colors that are natural how do you scorch it to make it look old i.e. mideval times?
I’m hoping that Toni can answer a question for me–I have a mahogony front door, faces brutal Colorado sun. The door is 2.5 years old and was originally treated with stain and then poly. Can I use a marine varnish over the poly to protect this door (the poly is already showing signs of damage, i.e. white crackling)?
Thanks much, Mary
Hi Mary,
The cracked poly varnish needs to be removed from the door before applying the marine varnish.
For the best results I would strip all of the poly varnish off of the door using a chemical stripper. I like the orange based stripping agent.
Thanks for the reply Toni. I was afraid it was going to be an intensive job. Would a stripping agent remove the original stain or just the poly?
It will be an all day project. When I stripped my solid wood door it was a two day project. Day one was stripping the varnish off and day two was applying the new varnish and letting it cure. I recommend doing this in the spring to early summer when the weather is nice.
The stripper will remove the poly varnish. The stain will be left intact. If you leave the stripper on for a long time it will remove some of the stain.
Hi, quick question: I’m interested in distressing a new oar. Most oars are finished with an exterior varnish or a tricoat finish, and are a natural wood color. I’d like my end product to have some residual color, namely red. Where in the process do I apply the paint that will later be distressed?
Thanks,
Amy
Huh? What? Oh yeah, the blog.
Hi Amy!
It is a little crazy right now with getting ready for Christmas. I just completed a set of picture frames for friends of ours. But that is a different post.
Is the look your after more like an old oar that was painted and the paint is pealing off? If so, I would apply the paint after the sealing step. This will allow you to work with the paint to make it look flaked off without it soaking into the raw wood.
Yeah, that’d be a good look, but what I really wanted was more of a faded, weathered look. Think that would be the same thing?
I’d love to see the picture frames. I just finished a dive flag memory board for my new office. I’m pleased with it, my first attempt.
I was thinking that applying the paint over the sealer then you could use a rag to wipe off some of the paint and give it a faded look.
I just received a piece of furniture wh ich has obviously placed worm holes! Is it me? Can this technique be so poorly done?
Unfortunately, yes it can. Just like any finishing project it can be messed up. You might consider refinishing the piece to make it look more authentic.
I would recommend you first start with a scrape piece wood and practice the technique before working on your newly acquired furniture piece.
I’m intersted in painting my kitchen cabinets an ivory color and letting the natural oak color show through. Would it be easier for me to complete the distressed look using sandpaper and a wire brush or would it be easier for my to paint the ivory color and using a wire brush and a dap of tan paint lightly add streaks of paint to simulate the wood color underneath?
HI,
I have a new-ish white wood bed. I really want that antiqued look. I read the instructions. I am not sure they apply for me. Any suggestions?
Thanks!!
Hi Karissa!
Thanks for taking the time to read through the entire process. (It isn’t really that long.)
Now, just to be clear, the bed frame is unfinished and the wood is a very light colored tan to white.
Yes, this finishing process will work on a bed. The big difference is that on a door it is a fairly large rectangular surface, where as, on a bed frame you are working with long and narrow pieces. Basically what your going to end up doing is to ’stretch’ the finishing technique to fit onto the project you are working on.
The idea of using the darker stains on corners of the door is that over time that is where more of the dirt and grim will build up. Same idea with your bed frame. Looking at the side of the bed frame the ends at the head board and foot board of the bed rail would, over time, collect and build up more grim. So, following the technique I would apply the darker stains on both ends of the bed rail and leave the center lighter.
If you think about it, you typically get in and out of bed in the same location, right? So, then that part of the bed rail wouldn’t build up as much gunk because you tend to brush against that part of the bed rail. That is why would make that part of the bed rail lighter and tapper off to the darker stains and color as I get to the ends of the bed rail.
Remember we are talking about several decades of use that your attempting to simulate with this technique.
I hope that make sense. If not post a comment or send me an email. Just click the big red ask button.
I bought a house that was neglected and it has a stained dark walnut, birch veneer paneling in the office and they made a wainscoating in the dining area. I love the look but it is in bad shape and needs help. I do not want to paint it because my husband loves it also. How can I make it look good.
Hi Susan,
I need a little more info on the state of the paneling. Is the paneling physically in good shape? Or is the paneling glue failing and it is separating?
If the finish is dirty, cracked and starting to peal off, it might be time to consider stripping the old finish off and then stain and varnish the paneling.
However, if the wood is damaged and you want to keep the paneling after you have replaced the damaged sections it will be necessary to then strip and refinish the entire paneling. It is possible to only finish the fixed areas, for example, a section of the trim molding was damage and had to be replaced. The tricky part is what is the state of the finish on the rest of the paneling? If the varnish has yellowed or is chipped and flaking off, I would stripe all of the varnish off and refinish it.
Toni -
We bought a cottage like home recently that we are getting ready to remodel. There is a loft area on the 2nd floor that shows exposed beams on the first floor ceiling. We want to preserve that look, but the last owner has it a solid dark brown - we are hoping to make it look like distressed wood. Any suggestions on how to accomplish?
Hi, I recently bought some wood furniture. It’s partially an oak color and partially dark green. It appears to be wood, not a laminate. I want a white (not shiny), distressed look….a couple of questions:
1. Do I have to strip the current paint/stain first?
2. What kind of white paint is best?
3. Any secrets as I paint/after I paint to make it look distressed authentically?
Thanks!
Hi Michelle!
Check out the post distressed painted finish it goes into detail on how to give a painted piece of furniture a distressed look and feel.
I resently bought a sofa table that
I would like to finish with an old
antique color stain and also distresse
look. I see where you can do it with
paint. But is the method of three stain
good for a table top. I would like it
to be dark and medium highlights throughout. Please help . I’m clueless
as to how to achieve this look.
Dear Toni -
I have a customer in a historic house out here on Long Island who had major water damage to her antique pine floors. She hired a flooring contractor to replace about 80% of the wide planks (15-20″) with new ones then applied three coats of tung oil. She absolutely hates the way they look now and they don’t match the dried out antique boards which were undamaged by the water. I already hand-scraped most of them, removing 99% of the tung oil, and was wondering if you ever heard of weathering new pine with a solution of vinegar and steelwool to turn them silvery grey? Or do you have another recipe for me to try on some scrap?
Matching old stains and aged stains color is truly an art form. There are a few different techniques that can be employed.
The first category of techniques relies on attempting to physically age / distress the wood and finish to make it look older than it really is. I have never attempted this so I really cannot speak about it.
The other category of techniques is to attempt to match the color of the old wood’s finish by using universal pigments.
I have tried this some success. The process is fairly simple.
Step 1: Select a stain that his closest to the wood that you are attempting to match. Stain the new wood this color.
Step 2: Seal the wood with a sealer that matches the existing wood’s luster and shine.
Step 3: Select the earth tone universal pigments that closely match the existing floor’s color and pigmentation. Apply these pigments in layers to match the existing wood’s color. The idea here is that as the existing wood’s finish aged it changed color and acquired dirt and other grim. However, you don’t want the these new pigments to soak deep into the new wood. You want them to “sit on top” of the base finish.
Step 4: Once the new wood matches the existing wood you will need to seal the existing wood. Use the same sealer a second time. This will “lock in” the pigments that you applied on top so that they will not get wiped away.
Definitively do this on a scrape piece of wood and perfect your technique before attempting to go full scale on all of the new wood.
Good luck. Let me know how your project turns out.
I’ve been researching how to distress furniture. My particular interest is in picture frames. I noticed on your blog you mentioned that you have done some frames. Was your process the same as above? Any tricks? I will be making the frames from scratch. Any guidance would be appreciated!
I have not tried distressing picture frames yet. The process would be the same as doing a door.
However, picture frames in general don’t take the same amount of use and abuse that a door would take. I would go very easy on the part of adding dents and other damage to the picture frame.
As for the finishing part, the picture frame would collect the most dirt and grim in the corners just like a door would.
Good luck. Let me know how your project turns out.
my question is I tried to buy dye stain at the paint store and no one has heard
of it. Where do I go to purchase this?
There are a couple of sources for dye stains.
Homestead’s TransTint Dyes
Sherwin Williams stores should carry dye stain concentrates
Toni,
Thank you soooo much for your step by step instruction for this process. I have seen what this process looks like first hand while touring a custom home. The builder told me the craftsman who “finished” the cabinets would not disclose the products or the process. He mentioned it was an 8 step process, maybe an exaggeration.
My questions are these.
1) Is “Stain Dye” different then the “Stain” we get a home depot? I did read about where to get the Dye, but wanted to know the difference.
2) What is and where do I buy the “Glaze”. What color is the glaze and do I have to spray it from a paint gun. The cabinets I saw were breathtaking; worth whatever effort it takes……. Please reply
You’re welcome Mark.
It really frustrates me when I see new finishing style and ask how it is done, only to get the ‘it is a trade secrete’ response. That is so lame. Some people want to know how do a particular finish and other folks are content to pay someone else to do the work.
Ok, I will get off my soap box now.
Question #1: Stain dye is the raw colors that can be combined to create a specific stain color. What you buy at the local big box home improvement retailer are premixed stains. You can take one of these stains and use it as a base and then apply the stain dye to it alter the color and tone of the stain to your liking.
It is like in art class back in school where you would take the primary colors and then mix them to create the secondary colors and just about any other color you wanted.
Question #2:
Glaze is a colorant that can be applied to wood after it has been sealed. Once, it is dry glaze will not wipe off. Stain, on the other hand, is a colorant that can only be applied to unsealed wood. As my parents found out years ago when they first applied a coat of varnish to their kitchen cabinets, then they applied a coat of stain and noticed that it wiped off completely. After forty years, the varnish has yellowed to a nice golden oak look.
Stain cannot penetrate a sealed surface. Thus, once dry it can be wiped off.
Glaze is available at your local big box home improvement store and also paint stores.
Do you have to shoot it with a spray gun? You can but you don’t have to. You can roll it, brush it, or spray it.
some methods of glazing I have found usefull…you can apply the glaze with cheese cloth leaving it on thick. Then you take a clean peice of cheese cloth and make a loose ball out of it and lightly wipe the glaze off always wipeing with the grain of the wood. Some of the glaze will be left in any of the distressing such as worm holes or scratches. Another thing you can do is to take a china bristle brush and tape the bristles leaving only about 1 inch of the bristles exposed at the end. Now you apply your glaze with the cheese cloth then quickly drag the glaze with the brush, this will give you a softer look with the glaze. Just remember to wipe the brush with a clean rag once and a while to keep the bristles somewhat clean. I hope this helps anyone out there……
have been looking all over internst for any any informatiiion on how to distress woo for kichen cabnets to do by my self this has part 1 and 2 have helped immensley