Wood Encyclopedia

Search and identify wood species from around the world — with origin, Janka hardness, grain and color, working properties, common uses, and how to tell them apart.

All Hardwood Softwood Tropical & Exotic Engineered Bamboo Reclaimed

Engineered Wood

Engineered Wood

A broad family of manufactured boards built from wood fibers, particles, or veneers bonded with adhesives — uniform, stable, and free of a single natural species.

Sweet Chestnut

A pale-tan, oak-like European hardwood — ring-porous, light, and naturally durable — long used for beams, fencing, coopering, and rustic furniture.

Calophyllum

Warm golden- to reddish-brown Latin American hardwood of medium density, valued for flooring, joinery, and general construction with a subtle ribbon figure.

Tropical & Exotic

English Walnut

European hardwood prized for warm brown heartwood and superb figure; the classic gunstock, furniture and veneer walnut.

Oriental Plane

A golden-brown Mediterranean hardwood famous for its dazzling ray fleck — the classic 'lacewood' figure on the quartered face.

Goupia

A dense, durable golden-brown to olive hardwood of the northern Amazon, prized for heavy exterior construction, decking, and marine work.

Boxwood

Exceptionally dense, fine-grained European hardwood in pale cream-yellow, prized for engraving, turning, carving, and instrument fittings.

Birdseye Maple

Figured hard maple dotted with tiny circular 'eyes' — a light, pale-golden North American hardwood prized for showpiece work.

Bulletwood

Extremely dense, durable reddish-brown South American hardwood with fine, uniform grain, prized for heavy construction, decking, and turning.

Tropical & Exotic

Koa

Endemic Hawaiian hardwood prized for its golden-to-reddish-brown color and shimmering chatoyant curly figure — the signature wood of the islands.

Red Alder

The Pacific Northwest's workhorse softwood-of-a-hardwood: pale, even-textured, and famous for the warm orange blush it takes on when freshly cut.

Black Cherry

A prized eastern North American hardwood with silky straight grain that ages from pale pinkish-tan to a warm reddish-brown.

Sapele

A dense reddish-brown African hardwood in the mahogany family, prized for its lustrous interlocked ribbon stripe and use in furniture, joinery, and guitars.

Tropical & Exotic

Lignum Vitae

A dense, oily, self-lubricating South American hardwood with bold light-and-dark striping — the tough, waxy stand-in traded as lignum vitae.

Tropical & Exotic

Yellow Birch

A tough, fine-grained North American hardwood — pale to golden-brown, strong and shock-resistant, and the primary birch of furniture, flooring, and plywood.

Genuine Mahogany

Genuine Mahogany

The classic cabinet wood: a medium-density tropical American hardwood, reddish-brown with an even grain, prized for stability, workability, and CITES protection.

Tropical & Exotic

Fig

The soft, pale, lightweight wood of the common fig tree — an orchard hardwood rarely milled for lumber, valued mainly for small turnery and carving.

Honey Locust

A hard, dense, ring-porous North American hardwood with warm reddish-brown heartwood, pale golden sapwood, and surprising decay resistance.

Hawthorn

A very hard, dense pale European hedgerow hardwood with a fine even grain, prized in small sizes for turning, tool handles and engraving.

Sugar Maple

Dense, pale North American hardwood prized for its hardness, tight even grain, and prized figure like bird's eye and curl.

White Poplar

A pale, lightweight European hardwood of the poplar family — soft, fine-textured, and odorless, long used for boxes, plywood core, and utility work.

European Maple

Pale, lustrous European hardwood prized for curly and burl figure; the classic tonewood for violin backs and fine turnery.

Black Walnut

Prized North American hardwood with rich chocolate-brown heartwood, pale sapwood, and superb workability for fine furniture.

Shorea

Broad Southeast Asian genus sold as meranti and lauan — a light tan, straight-grained tropical hardwood used for plywood, joinery, and utility furniture.

Tropical & Exotic