You can make wooden molds (ply or otherwise) for casting cementious materials, but they do indeed require thorough sealing. Poorly sealed wood causes two problems...first, the wood will "wick" excessive moisture from the mixture and weaken it, and second is the swelling of the wooden form that results from the wicked moisture. Good ol' Shellac (available in spray cans)is still about the best sealer around for wooden forms & molds. Several coats are required, but I have wooden forms that are many years old and still in great shape that were sealed in this manner. Once sealed, only a light coat of release is required. However...if you want to keep & reuse a form that you may have invested quite a bit of time/money in...there is another option. Instead of plywood, use Melamine board. It comes in 4 x 8 x 3/4" sheets and has a white plastic, Formica-like finish on both sides of a high-density particle board material. Made primarily for cabinet work, I get mine at the local H-D. Not really that much more than decent plywood, but infinitely better for long-lasting molds & forms. You do have to seal the cut edges, but the Melamine surface is 100% waterproof and as a bonus...requires no release whatsoever. A big plus if you are adding finishing layers or colorants to the surface since all traces of release must be removed before you can apply them. Check out any commercial cement casting company that makes architectural forms & castings and that's what you'll see them using. Best of luck.

You don't need plywood, OSB, landscape fabric or any of that - watch for my new book due out next year Cubic Foot Gardening - It will dispell all of the myths created by Mel and all his square-foot-followers. :) Seriously though - You can do whatever you like as far as the bottom goes - you simply need to consider what the plants needs are, and what yours are. Plants = drainage, support you = stop weeds, raise the bed, keep it clean.. etc. I wouldn't recommend the "chip board" mentioned in a previous post - it's referred to as OSB, and is not exactly weather-proof, and contains all sorts of adhesives and such. It's primary purpose is sheathing on the exterior of a house (which is then insulated, vapor-barriered, then covered with a weather-proof exterior - siding, stucco, brick etc.). Personally - I put my beds on the ground with no bottom barrier. Worms and other organisms are free to move in and out of the soil as they like, and I have the benefit of soil worked to a depth of 20". I use the sqft methods solely for spacing recommendations.

This question is actually pretty common. I posted a pic of our kitchen on the thread linked below, but boxer pups included some gorgeous professional photos. Ours is black and cream, but our neighbour loved ours and just redid hers in cream on top and a dark brown stain on the bottom. She used a ceasarstone counter with a cream background and flecks of brown in it. It looks gorgeous. I think the key to making this successful is to minimize other elements in the kitchen. The countertop should be either the colour of the cabs or a mix of both without bringing alot of another colour - same with the backsplash. When we first did it some thought it would get old fast, but I still love it and it's been 4 years. I think I would do it again, if I was to remodel another kitchen. HTH Here is a link that might be useful: previous thread on 2 tone kitchens

Thank you all for your comments - it's very helpful to hear all the different points of view. Just as an FYI for anybody else considering Omega Dynasty, I called the cabinet store and asked if there was a way to upgrade the Dynasty drawer bottoms from 1/4" to 3/8" plywood for an extra charge... and was told that no, that is not possible within the Dynasty line. The saleswoman said that in order to get a 3/8" drawer bottom, we would have to move up to full custom Omega cabinets (rather than Omega Dynasty), and that doing so would mean a price increase of 40-50% relative to the Dynasty cabinets. A 40-50% upcharge would put the cabinets out of our budget range, so after reading everybody's inputs and contemplating our choices some more, currently we are thinking that those 1/4" plywood bottoms won't stop us from ordering Omega Dynasty cabinets after all. Best regards to all, r.a.