The nice thing about tinting varnish is that it will be easier for someone later to remove the stain if they so desire, as Howie just said.
Howie, the color of the canoe looks wonderful to me eye as it is now. I agree with you about staining the new wood, because unstained it would just be too light for the aged patina of the hull. Below I'll add some images of a Morris I restored (with no stain). As you already know, the amber color of most varnishes builds a richer and richer color as you add more coats, so your already beautiful hull will only get richer and more beautiful as you varnish.
This is a great example of “It’s your canoe; do what you want.” You should choose to stain or not as you see fit, understanding that there is no possible way to know what a stained Morris looked like when it came out of the factory, and no possible way to replicate the look of that brand new, stained Morris on a canoe that is now more than a century old. I respect Dennis Kallery's commitment to devising a stain he liked, and he did so using remnants of ancient stain on an unmolested (but of course old) Morris, if I remember correctly. But we don’t know what stain Morris used or what it looked like when it was new and on new cedar. On tope of that, any stain concoction made today and applied to century-plus-year-old white cedar will not look like what did on new cedar back in Morris’ day (that is, “back in the day of B.N. Morris” as opposed to “Morris Day and The Time” ).
Don’t get me wrong – color matters very much to me. I’ve seen old wooden canoes that were truly bleached out during restoration, and they look nothing like I think an antique canoe should (in my opinion). But given that there is no way to make a canoe look like what it did when new (because we just don’t know and because the wood has changed over so many years), and because stains can sometimes obscure the beauty of old wood, I personally would not choose to stain a Morris.
Those in the discussion here don’t need this, but for anyone new to wooden canoes who might be reading, check out the links vs attached images. The gorgeous new white cedar canoes built in Rollin’s and Jerry’s shops and those of others have light, honey-colored interiors. The restored Morris shown below has a much richer color simply because of its age, but it has no stain. Both at antique boat shows and on the water, quite a few people have asked about this very canoe, “Wow, what kind of stain did you use?”, because they see the rich color and assume is has been stained. If stain were applied to new white cedar and the same stain were applied to century-old white cedar, the results would be completely distinct. Staining old cedar will not produce the look of a new canoe coming out of the Morris shop in 1908. But different people like different things, so go for what feels best and enjoy it. It’s your canoe.
Island Falls Canoe - Maine made custom built canoes, canoe restoration, canoe repair, and canoe building classes. We also carry Old Town Wood Canoe parts and materials and we perform repairs on wooden Old Town Canoes.
www.islandfallscanoe.com
Specifications B.N. Morris Length.......... 17' Depth.......... 12" Beam........... 32 7/8" Bow Height..... 25" Weight......... 75 lbs. Model 34-A, 1908 Reproduction Model "A" Type III, $6200 Mohogany trim and rails and two-tone paint Model "A" Type I, $4800 Short decks, spruce rails, no...
www.wooden-canoes.com
One of my Morris canoes after first varnish on the hull (but not on gunwales, decks or coamings yet):
The final product, all original wood, stripped, cleaned/bleached (Te-Ka), and varnished - but no stain anywhere:
