It’s been four years since we added the island to our kitchen and made our own wood countertop. The post about our DIY wood countertops is by far the most popular post on my blog, so I thought it would be helpful to share how our counter is holding up.
I will preface this by saying we are not gentle on our counters. We don’t always wipe up right away. We drop things, spill things and bang things. The island is our main prep space, so it sees a lot of action.
However, we do use cutting boards for chopping and don’t set hot pans directly on the wood.
After four years of steady use, the counter has held up very well, and I definitely recommend making your own wood countertops if you’re looking for a cheap, functional, durable solution.
The construction
We used the Kreg Jig and wood glue to join our 2x12s together and then filled the joints with wood filler. All of the joints are still tight. We’ve not seen any gaps between the boards and the wood filler has not cracked or chipped.
My big concern when we first made the counter was that it warped. However, it leveled out once we trimmed it to the right length and screwed it to the cabinets. Since then, the counter has stayed pretty flat. One board is still has a slight arc–my cutting board rocks a bit when I’m chopping–but it hasn’t worsened over the years.
Wood is soft, so there are some dents in the surface from where we’ve dropped a heavy can or jar. I’m not sure it’s possible to have a wood counter and not have some dents in it, especially after four years. If you want a pristine counter, wood may not be the choice for you.
The finish
We chose to stain our counter to match the existing cabinets in the kitchen, and then sealed it with Waterlox. Staining opened up one issue that I did not expect. We have a couple of chips along the edge. The stain didn’t sink too deeply into the wood, so the lighter wood shows at these chips. If we had used a clear sealer rather than a tinted stain, the chips probably wouldn’t be as noticeable.
The Waterlox finish seems to protect the wood fairly well. Water or other spills bead up on the surface and doesn’t soak into the wood. Most things rub out fairly easily even if they’ve been left for a little while.
Initially, I was a bit surprised by how shiny Waterlox was. This seems to be a common concern with the Original Finish that I chose. It appears to have dulled a little bit–or I’ve just gotten used to it.
There are a few spots that have dulled a little more than others. I’d characterize it as “etching” or watermarks where stains have set before we wiped them up. As obvious as the mark looks in the picture below, in real life you actually have to look pretty closely to see it. It just doesn’t reflect as much light as the rest of the counter.
The verdict
The counter looks and works really, really well. I’m a bit amazed that we made our own countertop and it worked–and four years later it’s still working.
For us, the wood counter was a temporary solution–temporary around here being 5 to 10 years. I’m not sure I’d recommend them for a long-term renovation, but I expect we will easily get another few years out of this counter. We know we’ll do a full gut renovation of the kitchen someday. But until then, we needed more prep space. The island and our DIY counter definitely gave us that.
For the work and money we put into this counter and the function it’s added to our kitchen, we are very happy with the choice to use wood and to make it ourselves.
If you have any questions about our counters, I’m happy to answer them in the comments.
Home on 129 Acres 