"Suanne Lippman" wrote in message
...
I am building a QSWO bookcase, with a mission stain. I hate the thought of
paying for QSWO shelves when they really won't be seen anyhow. Is it
reasonable to stain red oak to fit in with white oak?
Anyone with experience care to relate what he did?

I do it often when I am going to stain the wood. IMHO it looks fine.


I just built a walnut bookcase. For the shelves I used red oak plywood
with a 1" strip of walnut in front. I originally intended to stain the
oak to "match" the walnut, but the contrast looked pretty good, so I went
with it. Could do the same with unstained red oak and mission QSWO. Any
comments?

When there is a bigger contrast it tends to fine. With white and red oak
the color would be a bit strange as the red will tend to go from whitish to
pinkish and white tends to be white. If staining I doubt you would ever
notice. Left with a clear finish I would go with more contrast or the exact
same wood. I would probably go with a cheaper cut of white oak on the
shelves.