To stain...or not to stain

[Dino]

So. I am carving my girlfriend something for our anniversary.

http://i.imgur.com/69Hzayr.jpg

My problem is that I am unsure whether I should stain anything on it, or just oil it. I know she prefers dark wood but I don't want to stain the entire thing so my choices are;

Stain just the heart a dark colour.
Stain the "background", leaving the heart and the raised part where the date is (which I will burn into the wood).

Any ideas?

 

[marcros]

I would be very reluctant to stain it- I think it could go wrong very quickly and easily.

 

[Peter Sefton]

I agree with Marcros try to avoid staining if possible

 

[Dino]

Oh? Why is that? Is that because of the colour or the stain running?

 

[marcros]

Yes. You have no boundary between light and dark, and I think that cutting in a knife mark around the heart would stand out badly. If you have some scrap, a dark wax might work.

 

[Peter Sefton]

It may run or bleed into the areas that you don't want it, but if your sanding is not very very clean it will show up every scratch and may well grab into the end grain and go dark or patchy

 

[RobinBHM]

The difficulty with stain is that the amount it soaks in, is not predictable. It depends on the grain direction, sanding, timber density etc.

The background for example has areas of semi end grain which will soak up more, resulting in darker areas.

If you want to stain sections only it will be difficult to avoid stain bleeding resulting in a woolly edge.

Once stained there is no going back

If you fancy having a go, the usual advise applies: stain a sample first.

 

[Dino]

I've stained a sample and it turned out ok, I tried a few different stains to find the colour I would like.

Any alternatives to staining it to get the wood darker? Adding more coats of the oil onto the background comes to mind but I guess that would result in the same issues as the stain.

 

[Tetsuaiga]

I'd only stain it if you've done it before and are totally sure how its going to turn out.

I can't see the picture so don't know what type of wood it is, i've found using sodium hydroxide from two part wood bleaches can give a bit of a aged/light brown effect but I can't remember how easy it is to get a perfectly uniform effect.

 

[Dino]

Ah, I shifted the pics about so it's not there anymore.

Here's the finished product;

http://i.imgur.com/mG7XtZF.jpg

 

[Peter Sefton]

It looks great Dino, I am sure she will be very happy

 

[Dino]

She was!

 

[Tetsuaiga]

Ooh, that is very romantic =).

 

[Dino]

It gets better. Ever year we're wood burning a mark into it for each year we've been together.