I’m Giving Gel Stain Another Chance

I’ve taken a detour in the living room and entryway refresh that I hadn’t planned on, and I had even said outright that I didn’t want to do. But in the end, I blame this on y’all. 😀 I was fully prepared to paint the console table in the entryway, but I had said explicitly that I didn’t want to refinish it. The whole thing is waxed, so in order to refinish it with stain, that meant that I’d have to strip it and redo it. And that leads me to another problem. I built this thing out of cheap pine, and I generally don’t like the look of stained pine. That’s why it’s waxed in the first place.

But then my idea of painting it was pretty much overruled by the comments suggesting that I leave it a natural wood finish. I was prepared to do that at first, but the more I looked at it, the more I hated this splotchy orange finish.

And then I remembered that when I refinished the piano in our music room, the wood on that piano wasn’t all the same color once I had all of the pieces stripped. But the stain that I used on it, which was a wiping stain instead of a penetrating stain, did a phenomenal job at making the whole thing look one cohesive color. I couldn’t remember the name of the brand, but I knew I got it at my local Benjamin Moore store.

So on Friday afternoon, I headed to Benjamin Moore to see if they thought that stain would work on my previously waxed console table. And during the course of our conversation, the man who was helping me (and who seemed to have a lot of experience with staining) recommended that I use a gel stain instead of a wiping stain.

I’ve used gel stain before, and I absolutely hated it. I used whatever brand they sell at Home Depot, and I remember it drying too quickly, getting sticky too quickly, all of my brush strokes showing, and the color being way too dark anywhere my brush strokes would overlap. After that experience, I swore off of gel stain years ago and haven’t tried it since.

But he was recommending Old Masters gel stain, which is the same brand of wiping stain that I had used on the piano with such great success. He also gave me some great tips, like using just a little bit of Penetrol in the gel stain to keep it from drying too quickly. So I decided to give gel stain another try. This is what I left the store with.

He suggested that I wipe the whole thing down with acetone to remove any excess wax, but of course, I was too anxious to try out the gel stain that I skipped that step. (I’m not the best at being patient and following instructions.) So I tried out the gel stain on the end of the console table. I wasn’t thrilled with it, but I figured that I just needed practice. What I did love is that this product is totally different from the gel stain I used years ago. It stays very workable for a long time. No quick drying. No stickiness. It’s very easy to use.

And then I decided to try it out on a drawer front. It definitely toned down the orange, but I didn’t want to put it on too thick because I don’t want the color too dark, so the splotchiness from the original finish was still showing through.

At this point, I was doubting my decision and reconsidering the idea of painting the whole thing, which I’m still not ruling out completely. Here’s a comparison of the drawer (missing its trim) with the original finish, and the drawer with the gel stain. The gel stained drawer is better, but it’s still not what I want.

So I decided to put the stain aside for a bit while I think about my options, and move on to the other change I wanted to make to the console table (also based on your suggestions). I removed the bottom shelf. But because of the way I built the piece, now I’m left with legs in two pieces. I’m not sure if I’m going to try to repair those, or if I’m going to replace them altogether.

Basically, I’m making this up as I go along. I have my doubts that four turned wood legs on their own will be strong and stable enough to hold the weight of the console with the drawers, so I might try to design a totally new base that has more support.

Like I said, I’m making it up as I go along. But I do think I’ll like it much better without the bottom shelf. And since I don’t like the gel stain on top of the original orange, splotchy finish, I’m going to go ahead and paint the whole thing in a light brown color that doesn’t have any orange in it, and then I’m going to try the gel stain over the new color to see if I can create a stained wood look that way.

I have no idea if this is going to work out, but I’m going to try. If all else fails, I can always go back to the idea of painting the whole thing. But if you have any experience in using gel stain over a painted finish to create the look of stained wood, I’d love to hear your tips! I’m going to give it a try, but if this doesn’t work, I’ll be swearing off of gel stain forever.

UPDATE: Instead of turned wood legs, I’m thinking about doing a very simple base with straight legs that would allow me to add support between the legs on the sides and the back. It would look something like this.

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Addicted 2 Decorating is where I share my DIY and decorating journey as I remodel and decorate the 1948 fixer upper that my husband, Matt, and I bought in 2013. Matt has M.S. and is unable to do physical work, so I do the majority of the work on the house by myself. You can learn more about me here.