Building a table using Cherry

Cherry is a pretty good wood to work with and you should have no problem staining it dark. Matching an existing piece of furniture is another thing and I would recommend experimenting with scrap before you go to final finish. One of cherry's characteristics is it will slowly darken with age but this probably will not be a big deal if the existing furniture is fairly new.

RonB

Fume it or leave it out in the sun for a few days and it will darken quite a bit on its own. That will age it and you can adjust the color from there. If you make the match exact now, it will darken as it ages and you'll end up with a piece that's too dark.

Keith wrote: : My wife wants a end table for the bedroom and would like it to match our : existing bedroom set which is cherry also. The cherry is a very dark color more : like walnut but as I have never using cherry before I'm not sure if I can get : cherry that dark. Any suggestions or advice. Thanks again

Is it genuine cheery, or "cherry"-finished wood? A lot of stuff out there is aspen with a thick stain on it. Matching this will take some trial and error.

- Andy Barss

I had to match an Ethan Allen cherry chest that was a very dark brown. They use tinted lacquer. I found a medium dye followed by a medium stain gave perfect results. Either a dark dye or a dark stain were very wrong. It takes a certain amount of trial to get it right.

Was your bedroom set light when you bought it, and it has gotten darker over the years? Then ignore the above and put your new end table out in the sun for while to darken.