Types of Wood:

Cedar

A reddish soft wood that has a distinctive sweet odour.

It is extensively used in chest making, closet lining and household novelties.

It is very easy to work with, uniform in texture and is also resistant to decay
leading to its use as an outdoor house shingle.

Cherry

A close grained hard wood that resists warping and shrinking well.

Cherry wood reddens when it is exposed to sunlight. It ages well and is

extensively used in cabinet making, boat trim, novelties and solid furniture
handles.

Chestnut

A type of hard wood.

Chestnut wood loses its durability when grown beyond 50 years so it is

difficult to get large, long timber from it. It has always been highly valued
for small outdoor furniture pieces, where durability is important, as well as
fencing and wooden shingles for covering buildings, it is also used to
make barrels.

Chipboard

An artificial wood made like MDF (medium-density fibreboard) but from

actual wood chips.

It is widely used for the structural casing of kitchen furniture and cabinets
which are then covered with a laminate or wood veneer. It is also widely
used for low cost sub flooring. It is only useful in sheet form and cannot
be easily used or worked in any other format.
 Elm

Valued for its interlocking grain which gives it a high resistance to splitting,
with significant uses in chair seats and coffins.

Elm wood is also it quite pliant and is available in long planks due to the
long, straight, trunks of the tree, For these reasons elm is favoured as a
source of timber for keels in ship construction.

Fir

A fast growing soft wood which is uniformly textured and has a very low
resistance to rotting and decay. It is easy to work and finishes well. Fir is
used for making furniture, doors, picture frames, window frames, general
millwork and as an interior trim. It is also a main component of plywood.

Glass

Glass in its ordinary form will break under pressure into sharp shards, and
is therefore not suitable for use in furniture.

Toughened glass is formed from a prepared sheet of ordinary glass which

has been heated and then rapidly cooled with cold air, this heating and rapid
cooling process results in the outer surfaces contracting and solidifying
before the interior, thereby inducing permanent compressive stresses into
the surfaces of the glass. This type of glass is suitable for use in furniture manufacture and can even
be bent and curved.

Hemlock

A lightweight softwood.

It machine cuts well due to the wide grain and rarity of knots. It is uniformly
textured and has a low resistance to decay. It is mainly used as a
construction timber for planks, door panels, sub flooring and transportation
crates.
Lime

A hard wood that has excellent carving properties.

It is especially favoured for delicate work by master woodcarvers. Seasoned

lime is very stable and is soft enough to be carved and yet firm enough to
hold a precisely cut surface well. Lime also stains well, has good bending
properties and is often used for making furniture.

Mahogany

A finely grained hard wood which is reddish brown color.

It is extremely durable and resists swelling, shrinking, warping and twisting.

Mahogany is used extensively for high quality, expensive furniture such as
wooden cabinets and veneered tables and dressers. It is also used in the
construction of boats due to its high resistance to swelling and warping
caused by water.

Maple

A fine textured hard wood with moderate shrinkage, maple machines well
and is best used in flooring, fine furniture and hard wearing surfaces such
as bowling alley lanes.

Maple is a very light coloured wood and it is sometimes even bleached

before finishing to make it even whiter.

Medium Density Fibre Board (MDF)

An artificial wood made from powdered wood bonded with glue and
compressed to form sheets usually 2400mm x 1200mm in size.

It is quite soft, fairly pliable and very easy to work with. It cuts, sands and
finishes very easily. It is used widely for interior projects especially for
cupboards and shelving. Due to its nature it is highly recommended to wear
a face mask when sanding MDF as the particles are tiny and easily inhaled.
 Oak

A hard wood, light in colour, which has good pliable qualities despite its
durable nature.

It stains and finishes well and resists moisture absorption. Oak is great for
furniture, for which it is commonly used, due to its natural aesthetic qualities
as well as its strength. It is also used for boat framing, wooden desks and
flooring.

Pine

A fast growing soft wood. It has a uniform texture and is very easy to work
with.

It finishes well and resists shrinkage, swelling and warping despite having a
wide grain. It is widely used in the construction of timber frame houses,
panelling, mass produced furniture, wood pallets and numerous other
items. It is one of the most widely used timbers in the world and is so fast
growing that it is 'farmed' in countries all over the world.

Plywood

An artificial wood that was invented during the Second World War and was
primarily used to build boats and landing craft for the military.

It is made from numerous thin laminates of wood glued together. Each

layer is at right angle to the grain of the other to give it great strength while
also allowing it to remain quite pliable. The thinner the sheet, the more
pliable it will be. It is used widely in the building industry as a sub flooring
material or as a structural casing between walls.

Plastic

An artificial material that was created in 1862 in London.

The material was originally called Parkesine, was an organic material derived
from cellulose that once heated could be moulded, and retained its shape
when cooled. It has since been developed greatly with numerous variations
but its original properties remain its most valuable. The ability to mould
plastic into any form has made it a very popular material for mass produced furniture but also for
modern bespoke furniture where any shape or form is possible.

Redwood

It is light but relatively durable softwood that is easy to work with.

It has a good natural resistance to rotting and decay and is therefore

commonly used for making outdoor furniture, fencing and house panelling.
It is named for it's colour, a deep pinky, red hue through the wide grain.

Rosewood

A tight grained hard wood with dark reddish brown color.

It is hard to work with and requires a lot of polishing to achieve a good

finish. It is commonly used for making musical instruments such as pianos,
as well as tool handles, sculptures, veneers and furniture. It has also has a
uniquely pleasant fragrance which sets it apart from most other woods.

Spruce

A relatively strong soft wood that finishes well but has a low resistance to
rotting and decay.

It possesses moderate shrinkage and is light in colour and weight. It is a

good option for making masts and spars for ships, aircraft, crates, boxes,
general millwork and ladders due to its favourable strength to weight ratio.

Steel:

Steel, especially tubular steel, became popular as a furniture making material

after the popularity of the Wassily Chair, also known as the Model B3 chair,
which was designed by Marcel Breuer in 1925-1926 while he was the head
of the cabinet-making workshop at the Bauhaus, in Dessau, Germany. This
modern designed showcased the potential use of tubular steel as a structural
as well as an aesthetic material which gave added options to furniture
designers in terms of what unusual support systems were now possible.
Teak:

A renowned hard wood that is very moisture resistant.

It resists warping, cracking and decay and is used in a wide variety of ways
that make use of its extreme strength and hard wearing qualities, these
include furniture, panelling, window frames, ship building, church doors
and flooring. It is also sometimes used as a construction timber for its load
bearing capabilities, for example, as a cross beam.

Walnut

A hard word that is fine in texture, dark in colour and strong yet easy to
work.

It resists shrinking and warping and can take numerous types of finishes as
it takes stains and glazes very well. It is used mainly for making solid and
veneered furniture, cabinets, wall panelling and decorative novelty trinkets.