We had purchased a large, live edge, unfinished slab of wood to use for the bar top. After rough sanding it with a belt sander, we finished it by hand-sanding, using finer and finer sandpaper between applying coats of high gloss polyurethane. We started off with 80 grit sandpaper and at the end we were using 800 grit sandpaper! It took about 30 coats of polyurethane and sanding (we lost track of the exact number) over a period of two months. But it was so worth it:
