Varathane 358174 Premium Gel Stain, Quart, Kona

OMG..... I love this gel stain! I used this for 6 interior doors and 2 built-in desks for a total transformation of our business office. This DIY project took my old shabby looking oak to a new modern look with this amazing black gel stain. It was much thicker than I had imagined, making it ultimately easier to work with, a quart goes a long way and I did find using a rag to apply was the best method for this gel stain. It dried fairly quickly, I applied two coats and the coverage was AMAZING! This was one of a 3 step process that I used to complete my project but this was the major part of the project and the finish look is incredible. I am very please with the outcome and very worth the small investment.

Bought this to match my espresso furniture. It's a little lighter than espresso but it still is a perfect match. Also, the gel stain requires less coats to get a deeper color and good coverage. I stained a desktop and keyboard tray and still have a third of the 8 ounce can I bought.

This stuff was perfect for staining our front door and shutters to look like wood. Our door is metal. We wanted a wood door, but are too cheap to buy one. So we used a wood grain tool and this gel stain and love how it came out! It’s Really easy to work with and was the perfect color. The first pic is the first coat with the wood grain. Then the 2nd coat and then the final coat. Last pic is of our shutters and door together

With a lot of preparation before using gel coat , the results are amazing. I follow the instructions on the can and I watches a few videos on trusty YouTube . My diy project looks good , I did uses wood conditioner before the gel coat to get a better finish.

Great rich looking gel stain that covers very well with an even shade. I’m a big fan of Varathane products!

Works as advertised. It’s easy to overdue it and make it too dark so go as light as possible. Using a rag is much better than any type of brush. A little goes a LONG way. I covered 56 feet of 3” baseboard and 56 feet of quarter round and only used about 1/8 of the can.

Easy to use. Color is very nice. The gel stainstain

I got the dark walnut because I was afraid anything else would be too light or too red for this piece. I was trying to preserve the original color as much as I could while covering all the surface scratches. I did sand it down a little before starting because the scratches were so deep on the top. As you can see it did a great job. I had to slap it on real fast because of course right when I started the pot fell out of my hand. I don’t have the workspace or the time right now to do proper projects so it was good to have something that could go on quickly and easily to make the dresser pretty again. I did use a water soaked foam brush so that the stain would go on lighter otherwise it’s basically paint and I didn’t want to completely cover the old stain color. If you have the option to do it right definitely get acetone to thin this stuff cause gel and water don’t mix. (I know it’s a crime against all refinishing to have used water like this but it worked somehow.) So it looks great until I can refinish her properly in a few years.