We have beadboard in our bathroom and it is holding up fine thus far. I do suggest researching which paints will best handle the moisture in the bathroom. And Sharon, thanks for the idea of beadboard as a kitchen backsplash! We've been trying to come up with a frugal option, and it has been hard to find something that will work well over the melamine wallboard that is there now.

BM now sells it's original oil-based alykd (in a petroleum oil base), a water-clean-up alkyd (in a mineral oil base), and latex paint. They tell me that the water-clean-up alkyd is almost as good as the oil-based alkyd but I'm skeptical, so I went with the original oil base when I painted the inside of my exterior doors recently. The original oil base is supposedly going to be phased out (it already has been modified so much to eliminate VOCs that it isn't nearly as strong as the oil paints were "back in the day"). The water-based alkyds will remain available. This info is all per the owner of my local BM store and current as of 2 weeks ago when I bought my paint. As far as painting latex over oil goes, you CAN do it, but you need to prep well and use a bonding primer. I've been doing it (my whole house was oil based on the trim) for a couple years now by washing the oil paint on the trim to remove the dirt/grime, painting one coat of a bonding primer like Zinsser 123, and then painting 2 coats of latex topcoat. It's been fine. If you put latex directly on top of oil with no primer, it won't stick. The PO's did that in a couple of the bedrooms here, and I was able to literally PULL most of their paint off with my hands (I had to use a scraper in a couple spots, but for the most part, it came off in big sheets!) to get back down to the oil paint, which I then primed and recoated with latex. Yeah, that wasn't fun. So if you're gonna put latex over oil (or even the waterbased alkyds over oil), I'd definitely spend the time doing a coat of bonding primer -- better safe than sorry.

Thanks everyone, I can't wait either. Every week I ask DH, "Is it time to convert the dresser?" Poor guy is sick of me asking. It won't be long now. I wish once that bath is done the house would be ready to move in, but of course it won't. DH is taking it room by room for the finishing touches, not finishing as would say a regular builder and subs. Completely finishing that bath will be so exciting since it's the very first room I planned a design for. As promised, I'm going to take step by step notes and photo's of the vanity/dresser conversion for those who want to attempt this in the future. At the prices these converted dresser/vanities sell for retail, I told DH I know what he can do when he retires. LOL

I just don't know that vinyl is really necessary, my opinion. We did our basement bath in fairly inexpensive composite beadboard (not solid hardwood, but not pressed paneling) and primed and painted it with good quality exterior paint and have had no problems. And we have kind of a weak exhaust fan setup so we have had some moisture nearby. It's looked great for 10 years now. Also, just to your point about whites, my upstairs bath is all white (historical style 'sanitary' look) and it is like 50 shades of white in there :) When I picked paint color, I tried to focus on the lighting and looked at swatches in the same light conditions when I would be in the bathroom most often.