Quote:
Originally Posted by Pat Foster
In addition to what Charles Tauber wrote, I recall a time when the most plain, straight grain was desirable in all areas of woodworking, from yachts to furniture to guitars. You'll only find the most plain grain on vintage top-end six-figure guitars (topic for another discussion, to be sure) like 30s Martin 45s. My own take is that plain grain meant a sort of denial of the variability of natural materials at a time when plastics and other synthetics were becoming popular. Also, plain grain was and is the most rare and expensive. Synthetics on the other hand provided control over materials that we hadn't had before; we could then make plain, elegant objects whose visual simplicity was a way to show our ability to overcome the foibles of working with natural materials
Fast forward to today, when perhaps we've had our fill of the perfection we can attain with synthetics and technology, and we want to show off the beauty that nature can offer in the way of natural materials. With wood, what better way to do that than to use sapwood and wild grain?
Just my two cents.
Pat
|
Between this and the runout thread(s), this is the very thing I have been again pondering over the last few days. It doesn't seem that long ago that we only used select and better for shop class projects, but I now realize it's been over 30 years...
I'm active duty military and (again) stationed in Germany. Where furniture in the U.S. is mostly plywood and laminates (even in the higher end lines), "MassivHolz" (solid wood) furniture at reasonable prices is quite common in Germany and throughout Europe. Beech is the most common, followed closely by (white) oak. Knots are common, and acceptable. Initially, this seemed "wrong", and I would grade the wood as #1 common at best, and #2 common in most cases. "Select and better" isn't to be found. Germans in particular have "Wildeiche" ("Wild" Oak) as an option, and it has very uneven grain and a higher frequency (and size) of knots.
The wife and I have invested in a lot of furniture during this (and previous) tours, because it holds up to frequent moves and you only have to "buy it once". I have overcome the bias of what I would have found unacceptable at one time.
As you point out, abundance of inexpensive, select grades of wood is behind us. Our tastes are going to have to change. In general, I'm not a fan of sapwood, although there are tasteful applications (Kent Chasson's pics being a perfect example).