09 Apr 2020

How to Maintain Wooden Garden Furniture

How to Maintain Wooden Garden Furniture

How to Maintain Wooden Garden Furniture

5 reasons to care for your garden furniture & 5 steps to the perfect finish!

1.  Appearances matter.   Give your patio furniture a new lease of life!

2.  Rot and decay.  Shield against damaging fungal attack for a longer life.

3.  Usability.  Nobody likes sitting on tatty furniture so refresh today and relax in comfort.

4.  Cleanliness.   Freshly coated surfaces are easier to clean and maintain in hygienic condition.

5.  Protect your investment.   Well maintained garden furniture will give many years’ service.

Wooden garden furniture is divided into two principal timber types: hardwood (typically teak) and softwood (pine / cedar).   This guide will help you to choose the best maintenance regime for your furniture, and will provide pointers to the best products to use to keep it looking as good as new.

1. Clean

Ideally timber garden furniture should be stored indoors over the winter months to protect it from the worst of our British climate.   At the beginning of the season, clean your wooden garden furniture with hot soapy water and agitate stubborn dirt with a scrubbing brush.   Rinse with a soft hose.  This method can be used on both hardwood and softwood furniture.  

Hardwood furniture can also be cleaned more quickly using a pressure washer, set to fan spray and max 1500 psi.  This method is not suitable for softwood garden furniture as the strength of the water jet can cause damage by lifting the grain of the wood.

2. Repair

Allow the timber to dry out for at least 24 hours and assess it for any repairs needed.   When new, most garden furniture is supplied flat-packed and is assembled at home with screws and fixings.   These inevitably slacken, leading to damage so spend ten minutes with a screwdriver / spanner / allen key to tighten everything up and avoid this common source of damage.   

Pay special attention to tightening table and chair legs, which are best checked upturned with no weight on them.  If any screw heads or nuts threaten to bury themselves in the timber as you tighten, fit a washer.   Replace missing fixings and if any wooden dowels are sitting proud, gently tap them flush with a hammer.  Minor rot can be sanded and filled or patched up with “Kingfisher Wood Filler”. 

Cut out any rotten timbers and replace with new.

3. Prepare

Gently sand any areas where black mould or other contaminants have stained into the surface.  This is especially important on table tops and an electric orbital sander with a fine grit paper really takes the pain out of this task.   Vacuum up all the dust and wipe down the surfaces with a clean rig dipped in a little white spirit.

4.  Preserve

Treat with a penetrating timber preserver to protect your garden furniture from fungal decay.   Kingfisher’s traditional wood preservative is a high quality oil based preservative available both as a clear coat with built-in water repellent and in a range of attractive colours.  This will protect new and existing garden furniture from fungal decay, an essential primary treatment for garden furniture.

5.  Protect

  • Keep wooden garden furniture looking like new with a decorative finish which also locks out the weather
    K-X10 Wood Stain is trusted by thousands of joinery manufacturers, to provide a durable and elegant satin finish on most types of timber.  “Kingfisher” K-X10 provides long lasting protection against driving rain and damaging U.V rays in a premium grade decorative finish.  Available in clear and a wide variety of colours as well as a clear topcoat with a sheen finish.   On hardwoods we recommend one coat of “clear” to allow the naturally darker colour to show through.  With the softwoods, two coats are recommended and any of the colours will provide a stunning finish which still shows off the natural grain of the timber.


For best results, use K-X10 wood stains after using our wood preservative.

  • Finish off with topcoat for an attractive sheen finish (Optional).

K-X10 Topcoat is the finishing touch to our K-X10 wood stain colours.  This product will leave a subtle sheen and quality look and feel to your wooden furniture or outhouse.  Not only contributing to the look and feel but also providing your wood with additional weather proofing properties.

Our technical team offers support, if you have any questions about a project and need advice just get in touch!