Chinese Furniture Wood Types

Simple structure and minimal decoration set off the natural beauty of the wood.

Chinese furniture wood types.

Classic chinese furniture is typically made of a class of hardwoods known collectively as rosewood 紅木 literally red wood. This meaningful simplicity was achieved without sacrificing comfort. It is a member of the rosewood family and is botanically classified as dalbergia odorifera. Emit pleasant aromas naturally adding a touch of taste and grace.

Its hardness is useful in making of table tops and cabinets. Yes think rubber tree plantations. It is not as red as rosewood and stained in the brownish tones looking like teak walnut or pecan. In premodern times the wood was know as huali or hualu.

Many other native woods are tried some with success and others not so much. During the 80 s and 90 s the go to wood for a well grained look was rubberwood. Poorer provinces developed the lacquer technique to copy the dark color and style of the zitan or dark red sandlewood furniture. Elmwood is a softer lumber than rosewood and native to northern china it is a medium density lumber that is denser than pine.

Each type comes with a different set of characteristics in terms of color density grain and finishing. Ming furniture features durable and precious woods such as red sandalwood and scented rose wood which. These properties make them dimensionally stable hardwearing rot and insect resistant and when new highly fragrant. It s just that the furniture market is very material driven the most valuable and precious of all of these materials are zitan and huanghuali two types of hardwood found among other places on china s largest island hainan.

The chinese term huanghuali literally means yellow flowering pear wood. Native chinese woods are primarily elmwood beechwood pine and fir with some mahogany and walnut.