Making figured maple whiter and pop

[Shannon Brantley]

My old art teacher has commissioned a desk with a hutch. He wants the the base and hutch a matte white, the top glossy black, the hutch top a glossy bright red, but he's given me artistic freedom. It's a pretty big honor for me that this guy want's one of my pieces in his house. (He's got a freaking museum of artwork, Dali, Picaso, etc.) So I'd like to not just paint it. I've got some nice figured maple dimensional lumber and some awesome veneers to use. Planning on using Transtint black and red dyes with a lacquer top coat, but the white has me concerned. Since he's good with the base being matte, here are my thoughts.
1. Liberon Liming
2. Osmo white wood wax
3. Liberon Pallette white dye
4. leave color natural, clear paste wax
5. leave color natural, clear lacquer (last resort)
Basically, I'm not wanting to lose the figure. Any suggestions?

[roger wiegand]

Keeping it as light as possible while popping the figure is hard as they are kind of competing goals. I had a piece where I wanted to do that and had pretty good success using a first coat of "platinum blond " shellac https://www.shellac.net/dewaxed_shellac.html which brought up the figure, then a clear water based finish from Target (I don't remember which I used). Of course the maple has naturally ambered over time, so it has not stayed white.