Considering utilizing timber in your structure or design mission? Our information to fifteen of the most well-liked kinds of wood and wooden merchandise has hyperlinks to tons of examples for inspiration.
Ash is a deciduous hardwood that produces attractive pale timber with grain just like oak. Versatile, shock-resistant, and with no odor, it’s extensively used for furnishings and objects.
Architect R2 Studio used strong ash to create a staircase with a perforated plywood banister in a London home extension whereas Hannah clad an off-grid cabin in upstate New York with infested ash wood. In Valencia, Francesc Rifé Studio used ash throughout the interiors of a facial and dental clinic named Swiss Idea (above).
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Bamboo is a kind of grass fairly than a tree however its fast-growing canes are extensively utilized in structure and design each of their pure states and processed into wood-like lumber and fibers.
Bamboo canes are used for the structure, walls, and doors of this clothing factory in Colombia by Ruta 4 (above), whereas designer David Trubridge, has reissued his Cloud lighting collection using bamboo strips instead of plastic.
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Native to Europe, beech is a tough, heavy, fine-textured hardwood extensively utilized in furnishings making and as a flooring material. It is usually generally used as a veneer and the timber is appropriate for steam bending. Beech wooden ranges from creamy white to pink or pink in color.
Designer David Ericsson created the Madonna chair from solid beech for the Swedish model Gärsnäs whereas Peca designed cylindrical furniture with beechwood dowels (above.)
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This coniferous softwood is weather-resistant, making it appropriate for cladding together with shingles in addition to out of doors furnishings. It has an aromatic aroma and insect-repelling qualities.
The wooden comes from a handful of species of real cedar timber that develop at excessive altitudes together with Lebanon cedar and Cyprus cedar.
Moreover, there’s a vary of American conifers which are generally described as cedars, together with western pink cedar and Atlantic white cedar, that are technically totally different species.
Cedar-clad buildings are significantly frequent in America. Bates Masi Architects used oversized cedar shingles for the cladding of this home in the Hamptons (above and prime) whereas HGA Architects and Engineers covered these Vermont dwellings in cedar boards.
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The wooden of the cherry tree has a heat reddish color that darkens with age. It’s fine-grained and simple to work, making it a well-liked selection for furnishings and homewares as provides a wealthy tone to interiors.
Azman Architects used cherry wooden to create partitions in a London apartment whereas John Pawson paired the timber with limestone for his Jil Sander retailer in Tokyo (above.)
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The candy chestnut tree produces timber with a brown or reddish-brown color and a rough texture. It’s appropriate for out of doors makes use of together with cladding, shingles, decking, and doors furnishings, in addition to for indoor furnishings and objects.
Architect Ok-Studio used chestnut wooden for the lattice of a Greek holiday home, (above,) whereas designer Mikyia Kobayashi constructed an electric mobility scooter from the timber.
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The bark of the cork oak tree has come into favor in recent times as a fabric for each structure and design initiative. In addition to having a pleasantly musty odor it has good insulation properties and is fireplace resistant, making it acceptable for inside and external cladding.
Its noise discount properties, sponginess, and sturdiness make it appropriate for flooring as effectively whereas the sustainable approach cork is harvested without damaging the tree provides it good environmental credentials. On prime of this, cork might be recycled.
Architect Matthew Barnett Howland demonstrated the flexibility of cork by building a recyclable house from the material, (above,) whereas Jasper Morrison is, without doubt, one of the designers who have used cork conglomerate to make furniture.
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Native to western North America, Douglas fir is an evergreen conifer. A softwood, it’s a kind of pine fairly than a real fir and is often grown as a Christmas tree. Its timber is pinkish to pink in color.
Douglas fir, which is also called Oregon pine, is extensively utilized in building. Architectural makes use of embodying the cladding on this barn-like house in England (above) by Elliott Architects and the exposed structure of this cabin in the Netherlands by Crafted Works.
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Larch is a deciduous conifer that grows all through the northern hemisphere. The heartwood is often pink or brown in color. Robust and sturdy with waterproof qualities, larch is extensively used outside for fencing and cladding in addition to boat-building.
Initiatives utilizing larch embody Arklab’s twin houses in Germany that are clad in untreated larch and a house in Scotland by Mary Arnold-Forster Architects that is clad in burnt larch (above.)
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There are around 200 species of maple, starting from shrubs to giant timber identifiable by their pairs of winged seeds and five-lobed leaves.
This deciduous hardwood is extensively harvested for timber, which has a wonderful grain and ranges in color from white to golden or pink. The wooden is used for a wide range of indoor functions together with furnishings and objects and is especially prized as a flooring material for sports activities halls and dance venues.
Designer Thomas Heatherwick created a modular desk with wooden planter legs made from maple (above), whereas architect Naturehumaine clad a staircase in angular panels of solid timber as a part of a renovation of a Montreal residence.
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There are around 500 totally different species of an oak tree, lots of which produce onerous, sturdy, versatile timber that can be utilized structurally, for exterior and inside cladding, for doorways and home windows and furnishings and flooring.
Architect Thomas-McBrien used oak to clad the interior of this kitchen extension in London (above), whereas this off-grid cabin by Out of the Valley has a structure of oak beams constructed using traditional joinery techniques.
Oak furnishings contains Cecilie Manz’s Workshop desk for Muuto, which has a solid oak frame and an oak veneer top.
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There are dozens of species of pine. It’s a coniferous softwood, usually with a yellow or reddish color and containing many small knots that give pine objects and interiors a country look, plus a particular sharp scent.
Many kinds of pine timber develop rapidly, making their wooden cheaper than different timbers. This partly explains pine’s widespread use in building and joinery. Extra hardwearing than different softwoods, pine can be extensively used for flooring and staircases.
Architectural makes use of embodying the slatted cladding on this beach house in Chile by LAND Arquitectos (above), and this Swedish lakeside house by Dive Architects, whereas design initiatives that use pine embody a furniture collection by Studio Sløyd that attempts to revive curiosity in a kind of timber that has fallen out of vogue in recent times.
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Spruce is a genus of evergreen coniferous trees native to the northern hemisphere. One of the vital extensively used of all timbers, spruce wooden is usually confused with pine, however, is usually lighter and softer with a creamy white, pale yellow, or red-brown color.
A softwood, spruce is simple to work with and is used extensively in building, together with structural components and inside and exterior cladding, within the manufacturing of plywood and in carpentry.
Architectural makes use of embodying the cave-like interior of this suite at a luxury resort in Greece designed by Tenon Structure and the paneled interior of Kvadrat’s design studio in Copenhagen (above) by Caruso St John.
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Sycamore is the title given to a spread of deciduous hardwood timber together with the European sycamore, maple sycamore, and American airplane. It’s usually confused with maple and has similar-shaped leaves and winged seeds.
The timber is white to mild brown with a wonderful grain, generally, that includes a speckled sample.
Inclined to rot if it will get moist, the timber just isn’t usually used for building or doors functions however because it has no odor and doesn’t stain it’s extensively used for kitchen implements in addition to furnishings and objects.
Designer Faye Toogood used sycamore for a range of furniture whereas architect Giles Reid used the timber for a bar in a Japanese restaurant in London (above).
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Teak is a tropical hardwood native to south and southeast Asia, though it is usually cultivated throughout Africa and the Caribbean.
It’s prized for its prime quality and sturdiness as its oils make it naturally water- and pest-resistant, making it appropriate for out of door use.
Traditionally a boat-building wooden, right this moment it’s often utilized in structure as a cladding material and is common with designers for doors furnishings ranges.
Structure agency Studio Saxe used charred teak to clad the exterior of a seaside house in Costa Rica, and Spanish designer Patricia Urquiola used the wood for a range of outdoor chairs for Kettal.
Walnut is a dense hardwood that polishes effectively and infrequently has a pretty color and an intricately patterned grain. It’s significantly appropriate for carving and furnishings making whereas walnut veneers are prized by luxurious automotive manufacturers and cupboard makers.
Common varieties embody European (also called English) walnut and black walnut, which is native to the USA.
Furnishings that make use of walnut contains the 50th-anniversary edition of Arne Jacobsen’s Lily Chair, which is completed in a walnut veneer, whereas architect Scott Whitby Studio designed a bedroom that features bespoke walnut furniture (above.)
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Wooden merchandise
Quite a few materials merchandises are constructed from wooden and there are lots of methods of treating wooden to alter its look and efficiency. Listed below are among the best-known.
Blackened wooden
Blackened wood is more and more common as an approach of ending pure timber, significantly for cladding and furnishings. The floor of the timber is blackened by singeing it.
Cross-laminated timber
Cross-laminated timber (CLT) is an engineered building product of strips of wooden bonded along with their grains at proper angles to one another for rigidity. It may be used for small buildings just like the woodland cabin by Otraum Architects (above) and is robust sufficient to make use of structurally, together with for tall buildings such because the proposed 13-storey Dock Mill tower by Urban Agency.
Mass timber
CLT is an instance of mass timber, a broad time period used to explain a spread of engineered wooden merchandise which are sturdy sufficient to provide structural panels and beams. Different examples of mass timber embody glue-laminated timber (glulam) and laminated veneer lumber (LVL).
Plywood
Plywood is a product of skinny veneers of wooden glued along with crisscrossing grains to provide sheets that can be utilized for inside cladding, buildings, and even for exterior use when shielded from the climate adequately, plus a variety of merchandise.
Birch plywood is especially prized as a result of its wonderful grain and silky look.
Architects Diana Salvador and Javier Mera used plywood to build a cabin in Equador for themselves beside a river in Puerto Quito (above), whereas Toledano + Architects used steam-bent plywood to create a sinuous partition in this Paris apartment.
Steam-bent timber
Some kinds of wooden might be shaped into curves by subjecting them to steam, which softens the fabric and permits it to be bent in a mould. Steam-bent timber is extensively used to provide furnishings in addition to cladding and options resembling banisters.
Chipboard
Chipboard, also called particleboard, is a less expensive engineered product consisting of small items of wooden bonded collectively into boards.
Oriented strand board
Oriented strand board (OSB) is a product of bigger strands of wooden organized so their grains run in numerous instructions after which compressed and bonded. It may be used for bigger architectural initiatives, like this house in Alicante, Spain (under).
The latest common wood initiatives on Dezeen embody a cork and cross-laminated timber extension to a standard Catalan home, a pair of timber-clad cabins on a coastal hillside in Chile, a cozy woodland cabin in Finland, and a wooden tofu factory within the mountains of eastern China.