white trim vs. wood stained

This seems to be an old thread, but since people are still posting, someone might want to know...

I live in an old craftsman bungalow, which was built in 1915. My experience living in this old house, as well as the rest of the neighborhood, which is just as old, is that typically, the wood in the "public" areas of the house was stained, nicer wood, typically oak. The more "private" areas were trimmed out of a lesser expensive wood, birch or pine or fir, and generally painted. Same really held true for the floors as well. The oak flooring was installed in the kitchen, dining, and living room. Birch or fir for the other floors.

I also have small kids and I would somewhat disagree not to paint the wood. Painted wood is easy to touch up and clean....you get a scratch, you can lightly sand if needed and repaint. If you stain and get a scratch, you are a kind of left with a scratch, unless you strip and refinish! I have a window seat that is all oak and it's scratched to hell from a previous owner, to clean it up, I am going to have to resand the entire 10-12' long 15" deep piece of oak and hope I can match the stain. If it had been a painted piece, a simple quick sand and a fresh coat of paint and it'd be done!!

Many years ago in the early sixties, Homer Frombe Master furniture refinisher had a 15 minute TV show that came on Sat early afternoon I think on WGN. He got tired of the hundreds of letters every week asking him to repeat his formula. So he bottled it (ok.. Tin Can) and started to sell it.

0000 steel wool / lacquar thinner / mineral spirits / and if needed add a dash of boiled linseed. Clean the OOOO steel wool often..an old aluminum ice tray works well as a work tray for the spot or whole area refinish.

The laquar thinner melts the varnish... allows cleaning, and refurbishing of stains, watermarks, scratches..etc.. . Allow all to dry.. melted varnish
floats to the top.. and all looks good as new. Buff to blend with well washed old white 100% cotton t shirt.

Homer's heirs are still laughing all the way to the bank.

Stained finished trim does not have to be a refinishing nightmare, or the victim of a paint brush.

Stained trim and doors ... besides showing off the bueaty of the wood.. hides the day to day hand prints.

Many a fine tiger oak architectural feature has been lost to the paint brush and the percieved need to modernize.

"It's your house, do what you want to do !" hmmm. sounds like an old song I used to sing:wink::whistling2:

I can honestly say from first hand experience that white trim is a total pain! When we moved into our home (built in the 80's) all the trim was brown. We painted all the trim white in the downstairs and left it brown upstairs. The white trim gets very "beat up" in high traffic areas (where we come in from the garage, near the fridge, near the kitchen table, etc.) It seems like every 6 months it needs to be freshened up (painted) again. That may not be the case for people who don't have kids. We have four!. In the not so high traffic areas (like the powder room) it is always in need of dusting!. I don't just mean, come in with a dry cloth and dust, I mean come in with soap and water and clean! Once the dirt and grime has been removed it shows the bangs and nicks and needs to be painted, again. Ugggh!

On the other hand, when I clean my brown stained doors, baseboards, and trim with a lemon oil - they are shiny and clean and gorgeous!

I have a friend who built a beautiful home in PA. She used a light to medium stain on all her doors and trim and she LOVES it. All of her friends come over and say, "I wish I didn't have white trim and doors". She says it's so easy to maintain and she is very happy she went this route.

My trim is a much darker color than what I would have chosen. If I had to do it all over again from scratch, I'd use a light to medium stain over white any day of the week! I hope this helps.

this was a very interesting and informative thread. As a long time painter, I've stained new wood, painted new wood, and painted over stained wood, some of it past due and some criminal. I painted a brand new, custom built oak grand staircase not originally intended to be painted. the carpenter was furious. But the customer changed their mind last minute. I'll echo what I think I've learned over the years and mention something i didn't see mentioned. For stained trim to be truly impressive, it must be premium wood installed by a master carpenter, nothing less, and those two things will cost you. What I didn't hear was who is going to stain the wood. Both paint and stain are coatings, and painters apply coatings, but not all painters are coating specialists. The stainer must be as skilled and meticulous as the carpenter or the costs incurred to date are wasted. I've seen too many times where painters have destroyed finely crafted woodwork with what they thought was skill. I was recently hired, after the last guy was fired, by a lady who didn't understand that, until he destroyed her new French doors and frames. He was a painter, who knew. I've done some serious staining work over the years, but I'm far from a specialist, so I've sweat a lot of bullets over the years too. But I do know it requires a different understanding of wood and coatings, and another level of skill not possessed by the everyday painter. Screen carefully, you only get one shot.