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.
White Oak
Dense, ring-porous North American hardwood prized for its prominent ray fleck, closed pores, and legendary rot resistance.
Hardwood
Holm Oak
A dense, very hard evergreen Mediterranean oak with fine grain and gleaming rays — pale pink to light tan, heavy, and tough to work but exceptionally wear-resistant.
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.
Hardwood
Red Oak
The workhorse of American hardwoods — a strong, ring-porous, coarse-grained oak with bold rays, a reddish cast, and open pores you can see with the naked eye.
Hardwood
Ceylon Oak
Extremely hard, heavy South Asian hardwood (kusum) with fine even grain and medium-to-dark brown color, used for tool handles, crushers, and turnery.
Hardwood
Downy Oak
A dense, pale-gold Central European white oak with fine, distinct annual rings and broad rays — tough, durable, and closely related to English oak.
Hardwood
Reclaimed Oak
Salvaged oak recovered from old barns, beams, floors, and casks — dense, ring-porous timber prized for its aged patina, tight old-growth grain, and history.
Reclaimed
English Oak
A ring-porous European white oak prized for strength, ray fleck, and durable heartwood in furniture, joinery, and cooperage.
Hardwood
Cork Oak
The evergreen Mediterranean oak prized for its thick cork bark; the wood beneath is a dense, hard, reddish-brown oak used mostly for charcoal, turnery, and firewood.
Hardwood
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.
Hardwood
Pyrenean Oak
A warm golden-toned Iberian white oak with prominent ring-porous grain and bold ray fleck — a hardy, medium-dense European oak used for furniture, flooring, and cooperage.
Hardwood
Smoked Oak
European oak darkened throughout by ammonia fuming — the same tough, ring-porous Quercus robur, deepened to warm brown or charcoal without surface stain.
Hardwood
Silky Oak
A light golden Australian hardwood with bold ray fleck and a lacy, silky figure on quartered faces — the classic 'silky oak' of colonial furniture and joinery.
Hardwood
White Ash
A strong, pale, ring-porous North American hardwood with bold straight grain and outstanding shock resistance — the classic wood for tool handles and baseball bats.
Hardwood
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.
Hardwood
Eastern White Pine
The classic soft, lightweight, pale North American pine: fine even grain, distinct growth rings, and a wood that carves, planes, and paints with ease.
Softwood
White Spruce
A light, pale, straight-grained North American softwood — the classic clean, low-resin utility conifer prized for its strength-to-weight ratio and pale even face.
Softwood
White Mangrove
A dense, hard mangrove hardwood of tropical tidal coasts — light tan to buff, small and gnarled, rarely milled and mostly used for posts, fuel, and charcoal.
Tropical & Exotic
Mangrove Apple
A fine, dense, light-tan tropical mangrove hardwood — modest in size and rarely a commercial timber, used locally for tough, decay-prone service.
Tropical & Exotic
Lacewood
Australian rainforest hardwood whose quartersawn face bursts with a lacy ray-fleck figure — reddish-brown ground splashed with pale cream flecks.
Tropical & Exotic
Arborvitae
A very light, soft, aromatic softwood — better known as Northern White Cedar — prized for rot resistance in shingles, posts, and canoe ribs.
Softwood
Eucalyptus
A huge Australian hardwood genus sold as "gum": this sample shows the warm golden-honey, fine straight grain with subtle ray fleck typical of the eucalypt oaks.
Hardwood
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.
Softwood
Paper Birch
A pale, fine-grained North American hardwood famous for its white peeling bark; tough, even, and easy to work but not decay-resistant.
Hardwood