Cedar Chest - finish for white cedar?

[Bryan Nuss]

I am in the process of building a pair of cedar chests from local white cedar. While I do not want to apply any finish to the inside of the chest, it does require something on the outside. To prevent the lid from warping, I would apply finish to both the outside and inside surfaces of the lid.

Do you have any suggestions as to the type of finish that would be best? I don't want to stain the wood any colour, but a very slight amber is probably inevitable. I would prefer not to use any polyurethane.

Below is a shot of the unfinished wood panels. I have a Stot's Template Master dovetail jig maker on the way, and will make dovetail joints.

Thanks.

[Doug Shepard]

My vote would either be for superblonde shellac or tung oil. This doesn't seem like something that's going to get a lot of hard use, so I don't think you'd need a harder film type finish like varnish or poly. The shellac might be the better of the two in terms of being a barrier to moisture.

[Bryan Nuss]

Thanks for the suggestions, Doug. I am leaning toward shellac, especially since the wood is quite soft, so touchups should be fairly easy to make in the future.

[Doug Shepard]

You might want to try Zinser SealCoat. I haven't personally used it, but have read a couple of good reviews and very positive comments on 3 or 4 forums. Apparently it's dewaxed superblonde shellac. Anything that lets you skip mixing up the flakes can't be all bad.