Finishing cypress

[Don Shirey]

I am building an outdoor garden bench, and have purchased some cypress for it's construction.
However I have never used this wood before and am at a complete loss as to what to finish it with.
My belief is that the attractiveness of cypress is that it weathers to a beautiful gray color, but I
don't know what achieves this, no finish? oil finish or something else. Any discussion or advice is
welcome.

[William Fretwell]

Same as white cedar, it just goes gray in the weather. Applying a finish or stain just holds the moisture in and is detrimental outside. I would just seal the end grain.
White cedar is very white and looks weird on a deck, it screams stain me; at least Cypress has a bit of colour, or at least the heart wood does.

[Robert Engel]

In my area, at least (lost of cypress around here) most all the cypress now is what's called "pond cypress". Meaning, relatively new growth, and very little heart wood, if any at all. It is not as rot resistant as heart cypress. It is also not as structurally strong, so keep this in mind, too.

That said, it will hold up well in a vertical application like a board and batten wall on a barn. There are old tobacco and hay barns around me >100 yrs old and the wood is in amazingly great shape.

IMO you have to cognizant of this so any horizontal surface is going to deteriorate if exposed to the weather depending on climate and the ype of wood you obtain.

BTW, I always keep some around I think it makes really great drawer boxes.