Refinish Teak Furniture
Teak furniture is a symbol of class status. Not everyone can afford it, and even among those who can, not everyone has the type of house and rooms that go with it. It’s a bit like having a Louis Vuitton purse. It’s not enough to own one. You must have a proper attire to go with it if you want it to look good in public.
Nevertheless, some people refinish their teak furniture a bit in order to give it a different look. If you refinish teak furniture like that, the change will only be superficial and cosmetic. That means that teak furniture will retain all its natural qualities that make it so popular, like resistance to the elements and insects. On the other hand, if you refinish teak furniture, you have to follow the natural color patters of the wood, and you only affect the result by speeding it up or slowing it down. Any other change in teak, and specially drastic changes in color that aren’t natural to it is considered by most wood furniture lovers a waste of high quality.
Teak wood goes through a natural color change process which is induced by sunlight. This process turns wood slowly into silvery gray. Therefore, one way to refinish teak furniture is by speeding this process. This is done by letting teak furniture in the sun as long as possible, as opposed to keeping it still outside but under a roof or an umbrella. People who refinish teak furniture like this want the silvery grey color because this goes better to where they plan to use their furniture than brown color. For example, if the walls and other furniture surrounding are white with small parts of black.
On the other hand, there are people who want the opposite effect. To refinish teak furniture, they add teak sealer to the wood. Teak sealer blocks solar light, and therefore slows the process to a point where it actually turns the furniture darker than its natural honey color. If you want to refinish teak furniture like this, the number of layers you need to apply will depend on how dark you want your furniture. The darker you want it, the more layers you’ll need. Teak silver is better than varnish because it allows the wood to release its natural oils, which in turn helps the wood keep its qualities.
Finally, while speaking of varnish, never ever refinish teak furniture by applying varnish to it. Varnish is not permeable and it blocks the natural need of teak wood to breathe. This will result in the wood developing bubbles on their surface which, if left unattended, will crack or splinter the wood.