Almost any type of wood could be used to build furniture, but some
woods have always been favored for their beauty, durability, and
workability. Before 1900, most furniture was made with these
woods:
walnut, oak, mahogany, rosewood, fruitwoods, and rare wood veneers
and
inlays were in common use. American Colonial furniture, dependent
on
local availability, was made with maple, oak, walnut, birch, and
cherry, as well as pine. The preferred furniture woods were
readily
available, so less attractive or durable woods were used only for
hidden parts inside a piece. For this reason, pre-1900 furniture
is
almost always worth restoring.
As these preferred woods have
become
scarcer and more expensive, furniture has been made with more
abundant
woods; the traditional favorites have become rare. Today, most
furniture is made with ash, pine, gum, and poplar; pine, fir, and
other
inexpensive woods are used for hidden parts. The rare woods are
used
only for very good furniture, and they're often used in
combination
with the less expensive woods.
Being able to identify the type of
wood used for your furniture can help you determine its real
value.
Wood identification can sometimes be the deciding factor when you
aren't sure if a piece is worth refinishing or if it should be
thrown
away. There's a good chance that a beat-up old dresser, for
instance,
was built with what today is considered a rare wood. In this
article, we'll show you how to examine a piece of furniture and
what
details or identifying marks to look for to easily identify the
type of
wood used to create it. It will be helpful to know the basic
characteristics in all woods, such as hardness, grains, and color.
Wood Characteristics
Hardness: The simplest way to
describe a wood is to say it's a hardwood or a softwood, but this
description can be deceptive: not all hardwoods are hard, and not
all
softwoods are soft. The hard/soft classification is a botanical
one --
hardwoods are flowering trees; softwoods are conifers. Although
most
hardwoods are harder than most softwoods, there are exceptions.
In general, hardwoods are more
valuable than softwoods, because the wood is scarcer. But this
isn't
always the case -- gum, for instance, is a hardwood that competes
in
price with softwoods. A more practical way to identify wood is by
its
grain and color.
Wood grain and color: The cell
structure of a tree, different for each species, determines its
grain.
Hardwoods have tubular cells called vessels, visible as pores in
the
wood. If the cells are large, the texture of the wood is slightly
rough, or open; a filler may be needed to smooth the surface. If
the
cells are small, the texture is smooth; these woods, described as
close-grained, don't require filling. Oak, walnut, ash, mahogany,
rosewood, and teak are all open-grained woods; beech, birch,
maple,
cherry, satinwood, gum, and poplar are close-grained. Softwoods
don't
have vessel cells, but for all practical purposes can be
considered close-grained.
All trees have annual growth
rings,
made up of the cells formed during each year's growing season. The
types and arrangement of the cells determine how the wood looks.
There
are woods with subdued and with clearly defined grains; there are
straight grains, stripes, swirls, waves or curls, ripples, eyes,
and
mottled effects. There are colors from white and pale yellow
through
red, purple, and black. Every species has its own particular grain
and
color, and although they vary from tree to tree, these
characteristics
can almost always be used to identify the wood.
Furniture woods are chosen and
valued
for the character of their grain and color. Hardwoods usually have
a
richer and finer-textured grain than softwoods, but there are rich
grains of all colors and patterns. Woods with very distinctive
patterns
are usually more valuable than woods with subdued or indistinct
patterns, and the weaker-grained woods are often stained to give
them
character. This is why the old finish must be completely removed
before
you can tell for sure what wood a piece of furniture is made of.
How
to Assess Wood
How do you begin to identify the
type
of wood used for your furniture? This may seem difficult at first,
but
you'll find it easier as you gain experience. With practice, you
may be
able to recognize various woods by smell and touch as well as by
color
and grain. You should ask yourself some key questions:
- Consider
the piece of furniture itself. About how old is it, and what
style is
it? Some types of furniture are made with specific woods -- ash,
for
instance, is widely used in bentwoods -- and most new furniture
is made
with woods not used for older furniture.
- Look
at the color. Although color can vary considerably from tree to
tree,
its tone is fairly constant within a species; the color
intensity may
change, but not the quality. Some woods have very distinctive
color
characteristics -- poplar, for instance, is the only wood with a
green
tinge to it, and rosewood can be dark purple.
- Finally,
look at the grain. Is the wood open- or close-grained? Are the
pores
evenly distributed, or are they concentrated at the growth
rings? Is
the grain straight or wavy, mottled or swirled?
Now that you have closely looked
at
your furniture, you might notice it is made with veneer (thin
layers of
wood) or a combination of woods. Both are common practices for
furniture building.
Veneers and Inlays: Because rare
woods are scarce, and because they've always been more expensive
than
other woods, many types of furniture, both new and old, are made
with
veneer, a thin layer of wood glued to a base of less expensive
wood or
plywood. In old furniture, veneers and inlays of rare woods were
often
used to form designs or special effects; highly figured burl woods
and
other exotic woods were especially prized. In modern furniture,
veneers
are used primarily where solid wood is unavailable or too
expensive.
Many different woods are used for
veneers and inlays. Some veneers are cut from the crotch or butt
of a
tree, where the grain is more interesting; some are cut at an
angle to
produce a particular pattern. Some highly prized grain patterns,
such
as the bird's-eye figure in maple and the burl patterns, result
from
irregular growth. Some veneer woods, such as the burl woods, are
not
usable for solid construction because the wood isn't strong
enough.
Ebony, in contrast, is veneered because it's much too heavy to be
used
alone.
Veneers are fragile, and they can
be
damaged by refinishing techniques. Veneers are common in modern
furniture construction, so take a good look at your furniture
before
you start to work on it. Any highly figured wood is probably a
veneer.
It isn't always obvious what's
veneered and what's not. Sometimes the veneer is visible at the
edge of
the wood surface, a thin layer glued over the base wood. If you
can't
see a joint at the edge, look at an unfinished area under the
piece of
furniture. If the unfinished wood looks the same as the finished
surface, the piece of furniture is probably solid wood. If there's
a
considerable difference, it's probably veneered.
Wood combinations: Another
consideration is that many types of modern furniture are made with
two
or more kinds of wood, to keep the cost down. Rare woods are used
where
appearance is important, such as table-tops; the more common woods
are
used for less conspicuous structural pieces, such as table and
chair
legs. This multiple-wood construction isn't always easy to see
until
the old finish is removed -- a table you think is walnut, for
example,
may turn out to have gum legs, stained to match.
Furniture made with more than one
wood eventually needs special refinishing treatment. If you find
yourself with a multiple-wood piece, you may have to stain and
finish
the common wood again to match the wood of the most conspicuous
surface.
Once you are familiar with the
color,
grain, and construction style of your furniture, you can use that
information to determine the specific kind of wood or woods used.
Check
out the next section for tips on how to easily identify common
furniture woods.
LOCATION
