| Sample |
Species |
Description |
 |
Koa
Acacia koa
Hawaii |
Color
varies from tree to tree, ranging from pale yellow or golden brown to deep
chocolate, but more commonly reddish brown with light and dark bands in the
growth rings and various attractive patterns, such as fiddleback and
rainbow. The wavy and curly grain is moderate to severely interlocked, the
texture is moderately coarse, and the surface is quite lustrous and takes a
high polish. |
 |
Lacewood
Louro Faia
Roupala brasiliensis
Brazil |
Possessing one of the most unique grain patterns of all the exotics,
Lacewood is most easily recognized for its large rays. Usually it has a
straight grain and is course textured, with a light reddish-brown color. |
 |
Mahogany, African
Acajou
Khaya ivorensis
West Africa |
Color
is yellow to reddish-brown. Grain is interlocked with a straight, striped,
or roey figure. Texture is typically uniform medium to coarse, with a
natural luster. This wood polishes to an excellent finish. |
 |
Maple, Birdseye
Acer saccharinum
USA |
Known
for its clear, white sapwood, hard maple is a heavy, dense, and straight
grained wood. It resists wear and abrasion and is commonly found as flooring
in gymnasiums and bowling alleys.
Distinctive features of the grain
produce the famous birds-eye and curly figured woods. Interesting to
note, birds-eye is caused by a growth defect in the tree; small conical
depressions that appear toward the center of the tree and follow each
year outward with the annual growth rings. |
 |
Maple, Curly
Acer saccharinum
USA |
 |
Maple, Hard
Rock Maple, Sugar
Maple
Acer saccharinum
USA |
 |
Mesquite
Algaroba, Honey Locust,
Ironwood
Prosopis juliflora
Southwestern
USA |
Prized for it's honey color and interesting figure.
|
 |
Mopane
Colophospermum mopane
Southern Africa |
Mopane is a beautiful mellow brown wood with a dark, straight grain. It has
an ultra-fine and uniform texture and can be brought to a polished
marble-like finish. Density is 1100 to 1200 Kg/m3 making Mopane one of the
most durable and hardest woods in the world and is the second hardest wood
found in Africa. |
 |
Myrtle
California Olive, Mountain Laurel, Pepperwood
Umbellularia californica
Western USA |
This
tree grows nowhere else in the world except a narrow band along the coast of
Southern Oregon, in the Sierra Nevada and along the coast of California. The
early settlers of Oregon and California looked with amazement at this
strange aromatic forest giant. Myrtle is a dense hardwood sometimes varied
in colors of red, yellow, brown, silver gray, and black. The figure, if
present, is of burl, fiddleback, curled and wavy grain. |
 |
Oak,
Red
Spanish Oak
Quercus
rubra
USA |
One
of the most commonly known of all hardwood species, red oak makes for a
useful and fairly inexpensive wood. This non-durable, straight-grained wood
grows very fast, sometimes as much as a foot a year in some ecosystems.
Outside of interior woodworking, red oak is used for hardwood flooring since
it's fairly inexpensive and has a beautiful grain when finished. |
 |
Oak,
White
Chestnut Oak
Quercus
alba
USA |
A
versatile oak with many uses and qualities. This wood is straight-grained
with a moderate course texture and a pale-yellow to brown color. It wears
well and is resistant to exterior adversities. It produces some of the
finest oak veneers and lumber while being easy to work with and bending
easily. The most valuable aspect of white oak comes from its cells, which
contain a honeycomb like substance called tyloses. This makes white oak
watertight and thus great for boat building and ideal in making whiskey
barrels. |
 |
Obeche, Triplochiton scleroxylon, Wawa, Arere,
Samba, Ayous, Abachi
West Africa,
Nigeria, Samba, Ivory Coast, Cameroon, Ghana, Germany and Holland |
Predominant along waterways and on abandoned
farms in the transition zone between the humid evergreen and semi deciduous
forests. A large tree 150 to 180 ft in height, boles straight, cylindrical,
and clear to 80 ft; buttresses may reach to 20 ft; trunk diameters to 5 ft.
Timber whitish to pale straw with no difference between heartwood and
sapwood. Texture medium to coarse; grain typically interlocked, giving a
striped figure; lustrous.
Stains and polishes well.
|
 |
Padauk
Barwood, Camwood
Pterocarpus soyauxii
West Africa |
This
elegant orange-brown hardwood tree often grows in small groups and is common
in dense equatorial rain forests. The tree grows to a height of 100 to 130
feet, clear of branches to 70 feet, and has trunk diameters from 24 to 60
inches. Padauk possesses excellent weathering properties and will last for
more than 25 years in contact with the ground without any preservative
treatments. |
|
Actual woods may vary
widely from samples.
More Samples>> |
