Materials required:
Brushes of different thicknesses.
Gauze or cloth.
Chalk Paint Spray Pintyplus Colour Stone .
Wood stain.
fine sandpaper.
colorless furniture wax or water-based varnish.

We transform a melamine table top using a creative technique. First, clean the surface thoroughly with rubbing alcohol and spray paint the whole surface with Pintyplus Chalk Paint in stone .

melamine table top

Once completely dry, we paint over it with wood stain using a brush, not as a solid, even colour though. Instead, paint in one direction direction using varying pressure and amounts of stain to create the illusion of woodgrain.

Allow this layer to dry and water down the wood-stain by 50% for the second layer, applying and working it in the same way. Now the white layer should be completely covered with the wood-stain, but with a shaded wood-like effect as shown.

Finally, with a smaller brush and whilst the surface is still wet, we draw new finer grain lines. Once dry, we use a fine sandpaper to even out and blend the surface pattern/texture.

wood effect stages
wax finish to melamine table

You can see the original post in  Bricoydeco: imitate wood with chalkboard paint  which explains in detail the whole process.

Colourless Wax or Varnish?

To protect the work you can use colorless wax (as used in this post) or varnish. The wax provides a very smooth surface, but will eventually disappear and need to be reapplied, where as the varnish will be permanent.  In our case the most appropriate would be the varnish water based Pintyplus Art & Craft range . The reason is simple, both formulas are made with water-based resins,making them perfectly compatible

Thanks Mari Luz!