I would not want to call attention to this beam it is huge in comparison to your ceiling height I would drywall and paint .

LVL's are laminated and will not stain properly. You would need to wrap them with a stainable wood. I would also create posts at each end that give the appearance of supporting the beam. These posts should also be the same stainable wood.

Mike, I know it’s been four years and you may not see this, but in case you do :) We just did an open concept and added a 20’ beam. we have sanded it and plan to varnish it to bring out the grain. We love it. My question is, what did you decide to do on the bottom? Ours is three beams side by side and they don’t look as beautiful as the sides.

Just did this myself. Did you get any feedback or what did you decide to do?

Encase it. Stain whatever you’re wrapping in?

Funny how people just refuse to answer the question

Clamp and screw beam together with structural screws not to big. Clamp make sure. Drywall def. Can always remove an add wood. Don't glue Drywall. Your welcome

HU what did you end up doing? Hope you see this

For posterity of people looking at this thread, anyone who knows they would like an exposed engineered lumber beam, yet do not want to encase it, specify a glulam beam.

So I already have the LVL beam up. Are you suggesting to use a glulam beam?

That is out of the question but moving forward I’ll be sure to do that.

My brother wrapped his in 1x8x12 pine boards, sides and bottom, and stained them, including the accomoanying column to match. On my beam im planning to do the same, encase sides and bottom with solid wood boards and stain. I will attach the wood with glue and nail gun.

How did you treat the edges of the pine boards seams? mitre?

We rounded and attached to bottom. Ours is steel.

Crazy as it sounds, we might leave the vertical as is! The corner was actually constructed out of 1 tree, neat talking point ;^)

Hey, we are in same boat. Lvl beam, 13” tall, 5.25” wide and 20ft long. How did the Sanding version go? That looked cool but wondering if you had any black wiring and if you bleached it?

Black writing.*

Paint it black or white and leave it alone. DONE! Use wood filler and sand on the bottom if the ply bothers you. Only other option is dry wall or wood wrap it and stain.

Can you sand an LVL beam and stain it? I am having trouble finding wood long and deep eniugh to wrap them at 18’ x 14” x 6” I also don’t want a lot of seams My ceilings are 20’ high Any suggestions?

"Can you sand an LVL beam and stain it?"

I'd start by abrading the ink. You may need a glaze to cover that.