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.

East Indian Walnut

East Indian Walnut

A fast-growing tropical legume timber traded as a walnut substitute — usually brown-streaked heartwood, though this sample shows its paler cream-to-tan tones.

Hardwood
Cedar of Lebanon

Cedar of Lebanon

Aromatic Mediterranean softwood from the fabled Cedar of Lebanon — light tan to warm brown, fine even grain, decay-resistant and famously fragrant.

Softwood
Shagbark Hickory

Shagbark Hickory

A pale, exceptionally hard and shock-resistant North American hardwood — the classic tough wood for tool handles, ladder rungs, and flooring.

Hardwood
Deodar Cedar

Deodar Cedar

An aromatic Himalayan true cedar with fine even grain, light tan to yellowish-brown color, and good natural decay resistance — a classic building and joinery softwood.

Softwood
Red Mangrove

Red Mangrove

A dense, fine-grained tropical mangrove hardwood of the Caribbean and Central America — slow-grown in tidal mud and prized locally for pilings, poles, tannin, and charcoal.

Tropical & Exotic
Ebony

Ebony

Dense, jet-black tropical hardwood with an extremely fine, poreless grain, prized for instrument parts, fine turning, and inlay.

Tropical & Exotic
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
Lacewood

Lacewood

Australian rainforest hardwood whose quartersawn face bursts with a lacy ray-fleck figure — reddish-brown ground splashed with pale cream flecks.

Tropical & Exotic
Bamboo

Bamboo

A fast-growing woody grass — not a true wood — used as round culms and glued into hard, dimensionally stable engineered boards and flooring.

Bamboo
Brazilian Cedar

Brazilian Cedar

The aromatic 'cedar' of cigar boxes and guitar necks — a light, soft, spicy-scented tropical wood that is botanically a mahogany relative, not a true cedar.

Softwood
Grand Fir

Grand Fir

A light, soft, pale Pacific Northwest true fir with fine even grain and low resin — an economical framing and utility softwood, mild-working but not decay-resistant.

Softwood
Hemp Palm

Hemp Palm

The fibrous stem of the cold-hardy windmill palm — not a true wood but a monocot with bundled fibers set in soft tissue, light tan with a dark speckled fiber pattern.

Tropical & Exotic