I ordered 3 bookcases. All with the bottom solid doors, and 1 with the additional glass doors. Yes, one of the pine boards was split, but it was an easy fix with glue and a clamp. The doors are sometimes a trick to get to shut all of the way, but dinking with them = success. YES, it's whitewashed, YES you can see the pine wood grain and knots through the whitewash. It really is more of a 'vanilla' slightly creamy color than 'white'. It is ALL wood: which means I could get a similar board, whitewash it and add more shelves (yay!). I added 1 shelf more to each of the 3 bookcases. I could drill more holes and add more shelves if I wanted.... all wood makes these additions possible.