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.

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Sweetgum

A moderately hard eastern North American hardwood with fine even grain — pale sapwood (sapgum) and reddish-brown heartwood (redgum) that takes stain and finish beautifully.

Unknown Softwood

Unknown Softwood

A pale cream to light-tan European softwood of undetermined species, showing straight grain, visible rays and radial surface checking — light, soft and easy to work.

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.

Black Mangrove

A dense, hard mangrove hardwood from tropical tidal coasts — pale tan with darker growth rings; heavy and durable but small, twisted, and rarely milled into lumber.

White Mulberry

A tough, golden-hued fruit-tree hardwood prized by turners and carvers for its ripple figure, though sawn samples often read pale cream to light tan.

Stone Pine

The pale, resinous Mediterranean softwood of the umbrella pine — clear concentric rings, straight grain, and light tan color, better known for its pine nuts than its timber.

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.

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.

Softwood Plywood

Softwood Plywood

Cross-laminated conifer veneers bonded into stable structural sheets — the pale, workaday plywood behind subfloors, sheathing, roofs and rough carpentry.

Eastern Red Cedar

Eastern Red Cedar

A fragrant North American juniper — reddish-purple heartwood against pale sapwood, famous for moth-repelling cedar chests and closet linings.

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.

Silver Fir

A pale, lightweight European softwood — creamy, fine, even grained and resin-canal free — long sold with spruce as generic 'whitewood' for building and joinery.

Lodgepole Pine

A pale, lightweight, straight-boled Rocky Mountain softwood — the classic tepee-pole tree — valued for framing lumber, house logs, and utility products.

Blackbutt

A dense, pale golden-brown Australian eucalypt hardwood with fine even grain — a workhorse structural, flooring, and decking timber prized for strength and bushfire resistance.

Spruce

A light, soft, pale cream-to-tan European softwood with fine even grain — strong for its weight, easy to work, and the classic tonewood for instrument soundboards.

Norway Maple

A pale, fine-grained European maple with even diffuse-porous texture and a clean cream-tan color — a good-turning, easily finished utility hardwood.

Pin Oak

A ring-porous red-oak-group hardwood — pale tan with reddish undertones, coarse open grain and bold rays, sold and worked as red oak.

Ponderosa Pine

A soft, light Western softwood — pale yellow sapwood and warm orange-tan heartwood, straight-grained, easy to work, and the classic knotty-pine millwork timber.

Tree of Heaven

Pale cream-to-tan ring-porous hardwood from a fast-growing invasive tree — ash-like grain, light, satiny, and essentially free where it grows.