Stained moldings & trim DIY????

16 years ago

We are building a lodge style home and we want all our doors and all trim and mouldings stained. I'm wondering if any of you, did it yourself in your builds? Am I crazy to even think about doing it ?? We will be staining the main floor which is 2200 sq. ft; everything upstairs will be paint grade wood and painted by our painter.

Sort by:Oldest

Comments (6)

hadley
16 years ago
Haven't done it for a whole house, but have for the downstairs. Three tips: edge (sanding to slightly round)the edges of all wood pieces before staining; stain all wood pieces BEFORE they go up; use the wipe-on poly to finish AFTER the pieces go up.

Wipe on is so much easier to control, so much easier to get a nice smooth finish that I can't imagine why anyone would use the brush on stuff anymore. It has all the ease and beauty of oiling with the final hardness and sealing of poly.

Oh, four tips: If you fill the nail holes with the non-hardening stuff, be aware that it is oily--if you smear it on the surface of the wood around the hole it is nearly impossible to remove and you will forever see smears when the light hits it just right (or wrong). If you use it, do it AFTER you poly (so no accidental smears get trapped under the finish) and do it verrrrry carefully. On the last room I did, I simply looked at the holes and decided they could stay...

As for your upstairs, you didn't ask, but having lived in a house with stain downstairs and paint upstairs for 20 years, our next house will be stain throughout. Downstairs, everything done once, done right, no upkeep other than cleaning. Upstairs, most rooms are on their third or fourth "freshening."
beacher003
16 years ago
What you also need to consider is your cutting, fitting and coping skills. Paint and caulk can hide a lot of gapped miters but when you're staining you need to have very tight and accurate miter joints and coped joints.
I have about 20 large windows that I picture framed with 3.5" colonial stain grade casing and quickly learned errors were expensive.
A trade off is to use butt joints and or corner blocks.
Related Discussions
15'X28' Do-it-Yourself Greenhouse
Q
Comments (16)
7000ft, I am totally convinced you ought to write a book. Your family sounds very interesting and it sounds like you all work as a cooperative of sorts. How much of your food do you produce? The tomatoes that I grow are primarily for sauce, so I use Roma-type tomatoes. They are odd-looking, being long and quite large. The variety I grew this year was Super San Marzano. I've tried some others, but this one is the best. The sauce-type tomatoes are awesome for making sauce. They are very meaty with minimal juice and seeds. Making sauce is a breeze because you can skip the steps for squeezing the juice and seeds out. According to the catalogs, some varieties have pectin in them that helps to thicken the sauce. We ended up with 25 jars of sauce in the freezer. That is a record for us, so we are pleased! That's 25 dinners during ski season that I don't have to cook. :) I also grow a cherry tomato and some sandwich-type tomatoes. I've had good luck with Early Wonder, which is early yet tasty. (way better than early girl!) Inside the GH we enjoy our first tomatoes in mid-July. Without the GH we are lucky to get any red tomatoes at all. I'm sure it's the same for you. My gardening efforts are pretty much solo, but my husband was instrumental in building the GH and in helping look after things as needed. He is an expert at raising seedlings because I tend to travel a lot in the spring. He also built a root cellar and he is fully on board with our quest to grow as much food as possible. It's a bit of an oddball pursuit, so I'm happy that he's into it!
...See More
Trim - baseboards stained, other trim painted white?
Q
Comments (2)
Although it is in reverse.....stained doors and windows and white woodwork...look at "stained doors and windows with white baseboard" in the Home Decorating Forum....especially post from jaymielo. I happen to like the look of mixing them...that is the way it is in my daughter's home (stained woodwork, white doors) and to me it looks great.......to each their own~~
...See More
Window Trim Next to Crown Molding Staining ?
Q
Comments (9)
If all the windows are stained, and all the trim is painted, I think you are fine. As long as it follows a pattern, that is ok. There was another thread earlier about doors and paint vs stain and I think the conclusion was the same. If all the bedroom doors are one finish and the closets another, it is ok to mix. Just come up with a plan, follow it and you will be ok. There is no "one size fits all" here. Personally, I think stained trim can be lovely, but sometimes it can also be overload. I think having some stained and some painted may be the best of both worlds.
...See More
Decorating furniture with trim/molding
Q
Comments (2)
I would hunt for an independent woodworking shop and bring in photos of the existing project and any of ideas and talk to some people who work there. Sometimes they have some neat specialized products that you would not have thought to use.
...See More
owl_at_home
16 years ago
Ha! A very timely question for me. I just spent all weekend staining, and it was quite an ordeal. I had to wear a long-sleeved shirt to work today because my forearms are covered with stain! (Fortunately it turned chilly today.)

We finished probably half of the casings, but we still have the rest of those to do, plus all the baseboards and crown moulding, all the doors, and the stair parts. (The floor will be prefinished.)

It is seeming a little overwhelming at this point, especially since it didn't go that well this weekend. We are using fluted casing with rosette corner blocks around the windows and doors. The 3-inch casings for upstairs turned out ... let's just say acceptable. Then we started on one of the 4-inch casings for the downstairs ... it looked like total crap! It was a different wood and reacted COMPLETELY differently to the stain. So, we messed with it for a while and came up with something that will work. I think. I'm just nervous because we're going to have several different woods that will have to coordinate (fir exterior doors, clear pine interior doors and windows, pine base and crown, oak floor, spruce trim and whatever-the-hell the other trim is).

One of the biggest problems I have found, at least in my area, is that stores right now are not really set up to serve people who want to stain. Most people are painting trim in my area, so everything is geared toward that. Everything is available in paint grade, but if you want decent trim to stain, be prepared for varying degrees of hassle everywhere you go. So, it's not just the stress of getting the work done but also first locating the materials and persevering until you get your hands on them - in adequate quantities.

The good news is, they started trimming the upstairs windows this morning, and it's looking beautiful! I think it will be worth it.

Good luck!

Here is a link that might be useful: My progress blog
kemptoncourt
16 years ago
Allison had done some wonderful things distressing some stain-grade trims. Arts & Crafts feel. Maybe she'll send a link to the thread....I couldn't find it.
allison0704
16 years ago
Thanks, kemptoncourt.

We stained our 7 sets of french doors on the main floor ourselves but the painters stained all of the trim (before installation) and applied Sanding Sealer after installation.

We hand distress every piece of it ourselves before the painters stained. Also did the doors (inside and out)...so no, I don't think you're crazy. Just know it will take awhile and you'll be sick of it before you finish!

Depending on your home, it can be Arts & Crafts but our home is a European cottage with lots of stained cedar beams.

{{gwi:1502692}}

Here is a link that might be useful: Another thread w/lots of photos
allison0704
16 years ago
the thread Kemptoncourt was talking about (I believe)

Here is a link that might be useful: Few more pictures

Stained moldings & trim DIY????

Comments (6)

hadley

beacher003

Related Discussions

owl_at_home

kemptoncourt

allison0704

allison0704

COMPANY

BUSINESS SERVICES

GET HELP

CONNECT WITH US