I have miles of decking at two houses. All timber when put in the Australian sun will suffer. When building our beach house we decided to go for Spotted Gum and let it grey. Why fight it? We applied Cutek, and will on a regular basis. At our main house we have lots of Merabu or Quilla. Will not grey the same, and leaches lots of red stain. Cheap, but would not use again. What ever you use, use a good quality oil that seeps deep into the wood not a traditional stain/or top finishing product.

Hi Tina, thanks for posting, it is all looking great. Shame about the panelling, but sometimes these things happen for a reason. It is great the armoire matches the doors so well when they are all on one wall, but I don't think you need to have the bed and side tables matching, especially when they are on another wall. My issue with painting furniture, while I love it, is the maintenance. It does chip over time and becomes one more thing to paint. I don't know what the timber is in your furniture but another possible option, especially to give you the coastal vibe is to lime it. To do this successfully, you will need to sand all the existing stain off it and go back to the raw timber. The darker the original timber, the less limed look you will get so bear that in mind too. I did an old bunk bed up that had seen better days, for my grands bedroom. It was a dark red wood, but with 4 coats of stain I got the look I was after which was that driftwood/coastal look. The whole thing looks totally new again. Sorry I can't post a photo as this function no longer works for me. Have a look at the Feast Watson range of liming stains, they have some gorgeous soft colours as well, but they let the timber show through rather than having the solid painted look. It is a very easy product to use, it dries quickly - I did the 4 coats over 2 days effortlessly. The hard work is in the sanding.

One other thing, is the back finished the same as the rest? I'm just wondering if it's possible to remove a small bit of the lacquer on the lower back to see if you can determine the type of timber. Sometimes just seeing how the back of furniture is finished gives a clue as to how well it has been crafted. For instance if if it is not finished with same material as the rest of the piece, that is a cost saving measure and does not give the same value as if it was finished in solid timber. Hope this helps.

We're doing the same, 2 sets. Want wood but have been told they "may" warp, even though under a covered alfresco. Don't have a firm cost yet but indication from builder is $10-15k more than powder coated aluminium. Total width of each set is 3250 divided into 3 doors, with stacking security screens. Don't have a price for the aluminium ones yet to compare but +$10-15k has probably helped with the decision. Have bifolds at current house but will be going for stackers at the reno house because they can have the stacking security screens, whereas bifolds are difficult to security screen, you can flyscreen but it's quite a flimsy arrangement.