Protecting bare pine without changing colour

[Kamma89]

Hi.

Has anyone managed to do this? I've googled and can't find a definitive answer.

I have a pale pine table, want to keep the scandi look but it needs protecting. Tried clear Danish oil & it made it go a horrible yellow. Hoping to end up with a Matt finish, but colour more important than finish.

Any ideas welcome

Clear matt varnish?

Water based Matt varnish. You'll know it's water based if it says you can clean the brush in water.
The old spirit based varnishes used to yellow with age

Are you going to sand the Danish oil off? This will work, but the oil will clog up loads of sandpaper before you get rid of the oil.

Thanks both.

Have indeed sanded off all the Danish oil with a mouse sander & finished by hand. Other half applied & don't think he did a great job luckily as came off without too much trouble.

Will try water based clear matt varnish, I only knew about old style that turned things yellow. Will be test patching first!

Pine will change colour with age by the way. The natural resin reacts with UV light. I don't know how you can prevent that though

@sleeping this I did not know. When it becomes too yellow I guess i'll have to sand again and paint. Long

If you prefer a paler finish, you could lime wax it instead. I did that to some orangey pine bedroom furniture - stripped the original varnish off, sanded and waxed.

Soap flakes are the traditional Danish way, although with pine there will still be some darkening over time. It gives a flat matt finish. It's not particularly hard wearing though so needs to be redone from time to time.

Surprised that Osmo hasn't been mentioned yet. It's amazing! Have a look through their range but I was thinking something like this: www.wood-finishes-direct.com/product/osmo-polyx-oil-raw-3044

Osmo looks promising. Soap flakes maybe not hardwearing enough for a dining table. I did a lot of reading last night. Some blogs suggest bleaching the wood then finishing with a was. I've got a spare dining chair, so I'll test all the ideas on that & report back. Might be useful for anyone googling in future.

Beeswax. At least three coats. Lots of effort, but it's worth it. You can get clear and tinted versions.

Will beeswax prevent natural colouring? My parents had a pine dining table that we used to beeswax all the time and it was still an orange colour

Wax will slow down the change, but pine will go orange whatever you do (unless you keep on sanding it)

I had a piece of glass cut to size which sits on my kitchen table. The wood is fully protected and visible.

You could sand it down and then apply a white stain. I did this with a pine bookshelf around 12 yrs ago and it still looks good.

....I think it was called "whitewash stain". You can still see the grain of the pine underneath it.

I came here to say this too:

www.osmouk.com/sitechapter.cfm?chapter=82&page=312

Look at the photos. Has a bit of white pigment in. Perfect for Scandi look. Most other treatments will make it look the colour it is when wet.

The Osmo Raw looks like a good call.

Meant to add, you could add a slight tint in white which works really well as it doesn't cover the wood, you can still see the grain and it looks very Scandi. We used it for our living room floorboards and they still looks great. www.wood-finishes-direct.com/product/osmo-wood-wax-finish-transparent?gclid=CjwKCAjw9-HZBRAwEiwAGw0QcT1nO14SdApfIwqIyA7N_P6toHXAW8KmHVGrPoHf315PZ1NoJuMueRoCr1IQAvD_BwE

If you do use this product (3111 in white) then you'd need to apply a coat of the Osmo raw over it. (The product info on the link has all the details on this).