Wooden Beams - Lightening

[Dutchy87]

Good afternoon!

This is my first post, hopefully of many!

I live in an old building that originally was a brewery's grain store, built in the 1800s I believe. It was converted to houses about 20 years ago. It has many wooden beams running through it, pictured below.

Ideally, I would like to see these lightened a little bit. The house is quite small with not a lot of natural light pouring in and with low ceilings and the dark reddy brown that the beams are I feel make it seem a bit crowded.

Has anyone got any suggestions on how to get about this? I'm afraid I have no more information regarding what products were put on them, or what type of wood they are.

Thank you in advance!

 

[freddiemercurystwin]

Wood bleach?

 

[conny]

Have you tried to sand them?
The colour may just be years of air grime, such as dust, nicotine etc, which has never been cleaned off.

 

[Johnny Allround]

Good morning Duchy, you could try soap solution on a small piece as a test area to see what it brings out of the wood or a mixture of vinegar and water with either method wipe off with a damp rag or cloth. That should give you an idea of how light the beams might get to. It’s a slow but tried and tested method that we used to give apprentices to do way back when. Hope this helps.