Our Wood
Australian Burl
Origin: Australian burls are some of the most prized burls in the world, because of their exquisite coloration and spectacular chaotic grain patterns. In Australia, burls are harvested primarily from Eucalyptus trees such as the Redgum, Yellowbox, Mallee, and Coolibah. Burls can form on almost any tree as a result of disease, trauma, and environmental stresses, but Eucalyptus trees appear to be genetically predisposed to burl formation.
Color: The colors when oiled and finished are almost unnaturally rich burgundies, peach and salmon tones, and fiery oranges and yellows.
Uses: Burls come in all shapes, sizes, and colors, and their grain patterns are never the same. They can be used for something as small as a pen, a bowl, or a cheeseboard but also can be found in homes as massive coffee tables up to 5 or 6 feet in diameter.
Sustainability: They are a sustainable resource, because harvesting a burl from an affected tree does not kill the tree. Australia also has strict licensing agreements with a limited number of agents who are allowed to harvest and sell the burls.
Interesting Notes: Unfortunately, the supply of Australian burls in the United States has dried up in recent years, so it is a pleasure to find one and work with it. They are an enjoyable challenge to work with because they are full of holes, tunnels, and sap lines that all seem to be interconnected. Filling the voids in the burls with epoxy helps to stabilize the wood and to create a flat table surface, so the epoxy fill is an essential part of the process when working with burls. It takes a variety of materials and creative solutions to keep the epoxy from leaking out when it is poured into the burl and it is actually possible to pour epoxy into a hole on one edge of a burl and have it flow out from a hole several feet away. The one thing all burls have in common is that the wood is extremely dense and heavy, even with the natural voids that exist in them. At times when lifting burls it feels as if they are made from lead. With the largest burls, a small crew of people or a crane is needed to flip the slabs during sanding and finishing. None of these frustrations and challenges matter, though, when one marvels at the end product.
Honduran Primavera
Origin: Also known as “Blonde Mahogany”, Primavera is a dense hardwood that grows in Central America both naturally and on farmed plantations.
Uses: It is a tall but relatively narrow tree, making it perfect for coffee tables, end tables, bistro tables, and cocktail tables. Occasionally, it is possible to create a double live edge dining table out of a slab from a very large Primavera tree.
Color: Its color varies from cream to golden, which darkens and reddens with age, and is streaked by brown, orange, and red lines of grain. Especially colorful and unusually figured trees are termed “special grade.” Primavera shows a variety of unique and attractive grain patterns, depending on if it is cut in flat “cookies”, angled “oyster cuts”, or in long planks. It frequently has a ribbon-like figure, with the growth lines tightly spaced. However, at other times, especially in oyster-cut slabs, it has a more square, boxy “ladder-back” figure. Unique to Primavera is the tendency for the ribbon-like grain patterns to appear to be crossing over each other, which can lead to some fabulous 3-dimensional looks. It is not unusual to see some decay in the center of limbs, however the decay is easily filled with epoxy, and the unevenness of the decay is often a quite attractive accent when epoxy-filled.
Sustainability: Our Primavera is from a sustainably harvested source in Honduras.
Interesting Notes: The harvest must follow the phases of the moon. It must be harvested when the sap level in the tree is at its lowest point, which occurs during the dark phases of the moon, otherwise the sap in the cut wood will seep out and attract insects that damage the wood before it can even reach the mill. The most challenging aspect of working with Primavera is that it has interlocking grains and is susceptible to “tear out” even when cutting with sharp tools. Extensive sanding after cutting is necessary to make sure that all areas of tear out are removed.
Guanacaste
Origin: The Guanacaste Tree, the National Tree of Costa Rica, is known by many names throughout the tropical regions of the Americas where it grows, such as caro caro, monkey-ear tree or elephant-ear tree. Ours is from a private property with a mill and drying kiln in Mexico, where it is known as Parota.
Color: Its rich finished colors can range from reddish-brown to deep, dark brown. Inspection of the raw, cut slabs can usually give some indication of what the finished color of the slab will be. It has a very distinct thick white sapwood layer, often with inclusions of black mineralization drawn up from the soil, that makes this an excellent wood selection for live-edge tables. Some slabs have an almost hologram-like look where the color changes dramatically depending on the angle at which the slab is viewed.
Uses: It tends to grow as solitary trees in pastures, making it excellent for providing shade to livestock. The limbs are cut and used to make fences in many areas of Central America, and it is not unusual for these limbs to sprout into maturing live fence lines of Guanacaste Trees. While considered a hardwood, it is notably less dense than most hardwoods, and has been used to make surfboards in the past. Application of tung oil, penetrating tung oil sealer, and then more than the typical number of layers of finish help to substantially improve the durability of the slabs.
Sustainability: It is a fast-growing hardwood tree that can reach massive sizes which are excellent for creating large furniture pieces. Given its invasive nature, ease of reproduction both from cuttings and seed pods, and rapid rate of growth, it is a sustainable wood species if managed and harvested appropriately.
Interesting Notes: For furniture makers, Guanacaste Tree is a pleasure to work with, except that the natural oils in the wood, which serve as a bug deterrent, also create an irritating sawdust, hence the nickname “cayenne wood”!
Mesquite
Origin: Mesquite is ubiquitous throughout the Southwestern United States, but mostly in the form of bushes and shrubs.
Color: Under what is usually a plain greyish-black bark is a rich reddish-brown wood that comes to life when given a little attention. The wood is often twisted, cracked, broken, rotted, and insect-infested making Mesquite about as full of character as woods come. These voids are often unusually-shaped curves and they add unique artistic accents when filled with tinted epoxy or stones such as turquoise.
Uses: In some cases Mesquite trees can grow quite large and be used in furniture making. The word Mesquite makes one think of something rustic, and it most certainly is. Nothing grows quickly in the southwest, so a large mesquite tree suitable for furniture has had a long, hard life.
Sustainability: Ranchers are often happy to offer furniture makers the opportunity to cut up and haul away mesquite trees that are getting in the way.
Interesting Notes: Mesquite is heavy and the prized trees seem to grow best in the most inaccessible canyons where hauling them away can be back-breaking.
Spalted Alder
Origins: Alder is a medium density hardwood that grows commonly in the Pacific Northwest, from British Columbia to Northern California.
Color: It is related to Birch, and typically has a uniform grain pattern, a fine texture, and consistent pale coloration from tan to light red. Because of its light coloration, it is frequently stained before finishing. Alder in itself is not an exotic species of wood. However, Spalted Alder is a much less common and much more dramatic variant that is due to fungal discoloration of the wood. When fungi “digest” the wood that they have invaded, they create pigments in their byproducts, and these pigments can come in a rainbow of colors such as blues, mauves, pinks, reds, oranges. When multiple fungal species colonize the wood, they compete against each other for resources and often wall off their territory from each other. These “zone lines” can be jagged and distinct, usually presenting with a black pigment; or wavy and wispy, presenting with black, brown, or red pigment. These processes all do cause some decay to the wood, but the decay is generally slow and minimal. However, in the case of white rot, the spalting process is much more destructive and often leaves the wood useless. Kiln drying the wood will render the fungi inert and stop the spalting process, while leaving behind the striking colors and patterns that are so unusual and desirable.
Uses: Of note, most of the earliest electric guitars were made from Alder and Maple, due to their availability and the tone that the wood generated. Over time, guitar makers moved away into other synthetic materials. However, Alder electric guitars are still prized for their sound and their beauty, and spalted alder guitars are highly valued by elite guitarists due to their elegant presentation.
Sustainability: It is abundant and sustainable, and it is often harvested from managed forests.
Interesting Notes: Due to its abundance and consistency, Alder is has become a popular wood choice for rustic furnishings and for millwork during home construction.
Tzalam
Origin: Tzalam is a dense hardwood that grows naturally in southern Mexico, areas of Central America, south Florida, and the Bahamas.
Color: More desirable pieces have a dark chocolate heartwood, with some pieces showing reddish or purplish tones. There is a distinct line of demarcation between the heartwood and the pale white external sapwood, which provides a marked contrast in coloration. Tzalam can have a strong resemblance to Koa wood, a prized species from Hawaii, although the two can be distinguished under black light because Tzalam will show as fluorescent green.
Uses: It is a dense, durable hardwood, and it holds up to the elements well when made into outdoor furniture. Trees can grow up to 36 inches in diameter at the trunk, so rounds can be used for small coffee tables and end tables. Long boards are often used for flooring, because of the density and durability of the wood. Long double live edge slabs can be cut and combined with epoxy resin to make river dining tables and desks.
Sustainability: Tzalam is a sustainable wood, because it forms seed pods that drop around its trunk that readily sprout new trees. Ours is harvested in Mexico.
Interesting Notes: Because of its unique name, and because the grain pattern can be comparable, it is often called Caribbean Walnut for simplicity. However, it is not a walnut species.
African Bubinga
Origin: Bubinga comes from equatorial Africa, primarily as an export from Cameroon.
Color: It has a violet-red heartwood that contrasts strikingly with a pale straw sapwood and is often compared to Rosewood. Some slabs have striking figures such as: waterfalls, flames, and mottling.
Uses: It’s an exceedingly hard wood that can hold up to abuse, and live-edge pieces are often used in countertops and bartops.
Sustainability: Unfortunately, it has been over harvested and at this point is not considered a sustainable resource. A few slabs of Bubinga were purchased prior to when it was placed on the endangered list a few years ago, and while the project outcomes were excellent, the impacts upon the environment to achieve those outcomes were not acceptable.