Turner Pens
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Handcrafted Fountain Pens and Roller Ball Pens
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Turner Pens
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Wood Information
Amboyna burl (Pterocarpus indicus) grows in Southeast Asia, Indonesia. This is a very rare and precious wood and has a fragrant aroma. A dense burly pattern with eyes and swirls mostly without any holes and cracks make it one of the most expensive woods of the world. This was the first burl wood used for Art-Deco furniture and Rolls-Royce dashboards in the twenties. Rare yellow amboyna burl (Pterocarpus indicus) grows in Southeast Asia, Indonesia. This is a very rare and precious wood that has a fragrant aroma. A dense burly pattern with eyes and swirls mostly without any holes and cracks make it one of the most expensive woods of the world. This was the first burl wood used for Art-Deco furniture and Rolls-Royce dashboards in the twenties - always a n extremely luxurious item! Beefwood (Grevillea striata) is found in the outback of SW- Australia and has its name due to its colour, that resembles beef meat. the wood is extremely durable and was traditionally used by Aboriginees to make boomerangs. It is said to have received its name because of its similarity with a piece of well hung beef meat. The grain is straight to curly, showing wonderful patterns, almost like interlocked woven structures when taking a close look at it! Karelian curly birch (Betula pendula) comes from North Finland and Russia, where it is very appreciated and sought for. The attractive irregularity in structure only appears in a few trees among a lot of normal or poor figured birch trees. Very fine figured wood is the classical material for Scandinavian knifes. Bloodwood (Brosimum paraense), also called Muirapiranga (=piranha‘s blood), Brazil redwood, Cardinal wood or Satiné. The wood comes from Venezuela, Suriname and Guyana. Dense and straight grained, very hard and heavy. It’s easy to see how bloodwood earned its name: the colour ranges from various shades of rich lustrous strawberry red to rich deep lustrous red with undertones of purple with little figure. Bloodwood is one of the woods that retains its colour. If anything, the colour deepens as it ages rather than fades. Bocote (Cordia gerascanthus) is found in Mexico and Central South America. Hard and heavy it has a medium density and works very well. Colour is tobacco yellow to reddish brown with black stripes, often highly figured with eyes. Appears oily with a medium lustre. Bog Oak (Quercus robur) also called black oak is the subfossile wood of oaktrees, that were felled by natural events and came under water (often in peat bogs or aside rivers) and were conservated there under anaerobic conditions for hundreds or thousands of years. Depending on the time buried, the colour varies from light grey-brown over dark brown to real bluish black. The change of colour is caused by tannin reactions with water containing iron ions, taking thousands of years to reach real black colour. Bog or moor oaks are found when excavating lakes or digging gravel pits in the plains of large rivers. Bog oak is a very rare and expensive. Boxwood (Buxus sempervirens) is native to western and southern Europe, they are slow-growing evergreen shrubs and small trees, that seldom grow up to remarkable size. The wood possesses a delicate yellow colour; it is very dense and even in structure and has a fine uniform grain which has given it unique value for the purposes of the wood-engraver and flute makers. Due to its very slow growth it is one of the most precious woods of our days. Cocobolo (Dalbergia retusa) is a member of the rosewood family and comes from Costa Rica and Nicaragua. One of the most colourful woods available, it varies from red to black, dark brown to gold and yellow. It often shows similar abstract figures of spider webbing and landscapes as brazilian rosewood does. The wood is very hard and dense, finishes beautifully and is very durable. Cocobolo is quite rare, so only very small amounts come onto the world's market. Cocuswood (Brya ebenus), also called false, greenheart or Jamaican ebony, comes from the Carribean West Indies and Antills and is a very dense tropical hardwood tree. Although its name suggests, it is not at all related to the cocos palms. The wood is really very dense and extremely hard, green to brown cloured, and mostly shows very attractive fine figure and grain structure. Cocuswood has excellent tone quality and is used for reeded wooden musical instruments such as bagpipes, clarinets and oboes. It was used a lot for making flutes in England and France during the 19th century. Today it is very scarce, a real hard to find wood. Ebony (Diospyros ebenum) is a hard and heavy precious wood, that has a very straight and fine texture with metallic lustre. It finishes smoothly and takes a high glossy polish. The colour is generally black but sometimes lighter streaks appear, giving the wood yet more attractivity. This wood is a all-time-favourite through the centuries and if you hold it in your hands, you will know why. Black-and-white Ebony (Diospyros embryopteris) is a true member of the ebony family and is also called "Royal White Ebony". This unique wood comes from Myanmar (Burma) and Laos onto the market in very small amounts only. The wood is very dense like all ebonies and shows a terrific structure with black lines on nearly white ground- no other wood is even similar. Due to its very restricted availabilities it is one of the world‘s greatest rarities on the lumber market. Ebony Spotted, same as above but with another attractive grain pattern Goldfield burls (Eucalyptus spp.) are named after a region in Western Australia, where Gold was found around 1900. The wood is renowned for its rich colour, highly figured, tight and flawless grain pattern along with an extreme density and weight (ca. 1220 kg/m3). Grenadill (Dalbergia melanoxylon) ist often mistakenly called Granadillo or Ebony, but belongs to the rosewood family. It comes mainly from Mozambique, Africa. Colour is dark purplish brown with black streaks, giving a nearly black effect. It is an exceptionally dense, very hard and heavy wood, slightly oily with fine texture. Holm Oaks or holly oaks (Quercus ilex) are slowly growing evergreen trees and shrubs that grow in the Mediterranean macchia. Their wood is rock hard, extremely durable and shows really terrific unique grain patterns. The wood shows a great variety of different patterns depending on sawing direction, it takes a mirror polish. Some really tiny holes may occur from typical mediterranean insects. A rare and hard to find beautiful wood. Imbuia (Ocotea porosa) grows in Southern Brazil and is also called Brazilian Walnut or pepperwood due to its aromatic and spicy, resinous scent and taste when being cut. It is a medium dense and hard wood, moderately heavy and the heartwood is very resistant and durable. The colour is yellow-olive to chocolate brown, sometimes dark brown, with variegated streaks and stripes. Grain pattern varies widely, with many different irregular figures, giving it a spectacular look. Lapacho, Ipè (Tabebuia avellanedae) is a very hard and durable wood from tropical Southamerica. The wood has a unique greenish-yellow colour and shows very fine grain. Mineralic contents (Lapachol) are said to be healing and give the wood an attractive glimmerinmg lustre. It is used for decks, docks, fine veneer, railway ties, and work requiring highest wear resistance and resistance to decay. A very tough wood. Ironwood (Swartzia madagascariensis) is a very hard and dense wood of dark deep brown to brown black colour with bright yellow sapwood. Althoug it is very hard it works very well, just a little bit more power is needed when working on it. It is used for instrument bows, walking sticks and pens. Kingwood (Dalbergia cearensis) is also called violet wood or Bois de violette, comes from North-eastern Brazil (from Ceará and southern Bahia) and is one of the very precious woods in the timber trade. Trees only develop small stems with a maximum of ca. 20 cm diameter. The colour is violet-brown to purple with fine black veining, usually straight grained. Kingwood is excellent for wood turning and carving, as well as inlays and sculpture. It works very well and finishes to an exceptionally smooth natural finish. Lacewood (Roupala cordifolia) is a very neat and attractive exotic wood, that is used for precious and decorative small boxes, intarsia, turning, pens, knife and gun scales. It comes from South American tropical forests and is rather scarce.Lacewood possesses one of the most unique grain patterns of all exotic woods and is most easily recognized by its large medullary rays, looking like stringed pearls on a line. These are only visible when wood is quartersawn. The grain is quite straight, light reddish-orange-brown and course textured.
Lignum vitae's (Guaiacum spp.) name derives from its medicinal uses.
Christopher Columbus found Palo Santo or guaiacum trees upon his arrival to the
New World, the very slowly growing tree is found in Mexico, Central South
America and on Caribbean Islands. It is the hardest and most dense of all woods,
the color varies from light olive green to greenish-golden brown. This wood is
oily, containing a high amount of resin. It polishes well and is extremely
durable, offering exotic spice smell when working. The wood is so loaded with
fats and resins that objects made from it are self-lubricating and nearly
impervious to water. Macassar ebony (Diospyros celebica) is referred to as "coloured ebony". The name Makassar refers to its formerly main exporting seaport Makassar on the Indonesion Island Celebes, now Sulawesi. The trees usually are not thick and often discoloured, so fine Macassar ebony is one of the highest prized woods in the trade, available only in restricted amounts. Cuban mahogany (Swietenia mahagoni) is also called baywood, Caoba, Havana wood and is widely considered as the top mahogany, but over-harvesting wiped out what was considered to be the Caribbean’s finest natural resource. It is a heavy, tight-grained wood with a rich, reddish to red-brown colour that darkens with light exposure. It carves beautifully, and machines like a dream! Easily finished, the wood takes an excellent polish and has a natural high lustre. These Pen blanks were cut from parts of antique furniture from the early 19th century! This wood is also called hard maple (Acer saccharum) (F: erable moucheté) and comes from the sugar maple tree of Canada and North America. The wood is very hard and dense, heavy and only sometimes beautifully figured, showing a very attractive pattern of small eyes, that gave this special wood its name. Fiddleback maple (Acer pseudoplatanus),finest qualities come from Scotland, Bosnia and South Germany and is very much sought by fiddle and guitar makers. Its special structure is formed by parallel lines of wavy grain showing the unique structure that has been so appreciated for hundreds of years. Mulberry trees (Morus nigra + alba) are native to Asia and now spread over nearly all southern European countries. They have been tried to cultivate 200 Years ago in northern Europe, as their leaves were the only accepted food by the silkworms, when people tried to breed and cultivate these in order to produce silken fabrics.The trees were not tough enough to stand the northern European winters, so mulberries are hard to be found in our regions today. The wood is seldom traded, although it is a really beautiful one: Mulberries produce a very strong, durable hard and attractive golden yellow to brown coloured heartwood, that is suited for all fine works and that was traditionally used for wine casks. Turkish Saz or Bağlama string instruments are traditionally made of mulberry wood. Mun Ebony, Vietnam ebony (Diospyros mun) is an endemic species of Vietnam and Laos, a rarely and slow growing, widely spread tree of the rain forest. The wood is quite scarce and therefore high priced in SE Asia, beeing used only for the finest purposes. The colour ranges from dark green to black striping on a tan background, only the finest qualities showing narrow parallel stripes on yellow brown background. The wood is very dense and hard, shows
no grain and is very durable, taking extremely fine polish! Olive wood (Olea europaea) comes from the Mediterranean region, Italy, Greece, Middle East and North Africa. The tree grows very slowly and can reach thousands of years of age and its wood is said to be one of the most beautiful woods of the world. The lumber then takes 10 to 20 years to season, depending on thickness. The wood has a very fine texture and its a pleasure to work with it because it cuts and carves very well. African Padauk (Pterocarpus spp.) comes mainly from Western Afrikas Cameroon, the wood is hard, dense, heavy and shows a vibrant bright red colour. Due to its great working qualities it is used for a lot of musical instruments and for fine turned objects. The wood works very well and its bright colour should be protected against ultraviolet rays. These blanks show a very rare fiddleback figure! Black Palm wood (Caryota spp.) is one of only a few palms utilized for timber and generally comes from nearly all tropical countries, in Europe it is imported mainly from Sri Lanka. Like all other palms black palm has a soft and fibrous core with useful hard material only on the extreme outer parts of the logs, resulting in only small sizes being offered. The wood is very hard and has an unique structure, dark brown to nearly black colour grounfd is accentuated by hard black streaks. The end grain sight is so beautiful and unusual, that this wood was used as end grain veneer during the Art Deco period for really teriffic objects of art. Red palm wood (Cocos nucifera) comes from southeast Asia and is one of the most unusual woods of the world: its structure is unlike any other wood, it has very unusual grain consisting of interlocking strands of light-yellow to pink reddish colour with attractive red to reddish-brown to black streaks. The end grain in this wood looks really neat. An excellent turning wood, it is hard and finishes fine, yet a bit brittle. As palm trees are no real trees but like a grass or bamboo, only the exterior of the "stem" is usable and hard, the interior being soft and weak. During the Art-deco period it was used on finest designers furniture. Pink Ivory (Rhamnus zeyheri) grows only in South-East Africa (Zimbabwe, Mozambique, Eastern South Africa) and is one of the rarest woods on earth, the tree is protected in South Africa and may only be felled with special, hard to obtain permission. In the past it was called the "royal wood" of the Zulus, only tribal chieftains were allowed to fell the Pink Ivory tree, others are said to be sentenced to death for its pure possession. When the wood is polished, its pink heartwood takes on the luster of a precious stone while retaining the warmth of wood- a unique colour in the world of woods. Domestic Plumtree (Prunus domestica) grows in southern and middle Europe and is cultivated for his delicious fruits. Although this tree is common to nearly anybody in form of jellies, slivovitz and fruits, the trees offers a spectacular fine wood with fantastic colours. These range from a pale pink to reddish brown and even sometimes purple streaked, the heartwood is clearly separated from the pale yellow sapwood. The wood ages to a real dark mahogany-like deep red to brown glossy tone and is therefore very much appreciated by wood turners, woodwind instrument makers, knife makers and a lot more craftsmen. Purpleheart, Bois violet (F) (Peltogyne paniculata) comes from Mexico, Surinam and British Guyana. Freshly cut its colour is dull grey brown but turns rapidly into a vivid purple. It has a little figure, even texture, is very hard and heavy and works well. This wood should be sealed to protect its unique colour! Red Heart (Sickingia salvadorensis) also known as Chakte Kok, is a really unique wood, its colour cannot be compared to any other wood you know. The colour varies from fiery red to deep red, sometimes violet streaked, aging to deep crimson. The small tree is native to the east coast of Yucatan, Mexico up to southern Paraguay. Being of medium density it is nearly without any pores, has a medium to high hardness and is really very stable like teak. Works excetionally well, but should be protected against UV radiation. Redwood Burl (Sequoia sempervirens) comes from the huge Californian coastal redwood trees, where the burls are often found on the base of the trunk. These trees are the largest and longest living plants on earth, they can reach up to 2000 years of age! The fine figured and beautiful curly wood is often gained from tree stubs that were cut down around 1900 and that remained unrotten in the ground till nowadays: this wood belongs to the most durable ones and besides is a real beautiful rarity for woodworkers! Santos Rosewood (Machaerium scleroxylon), also called Morado or Bolivian Rosewood is no genuine rosewood (Dalbergia spp.) but belongs to the leguminosae family. It is a dense wood from Central and South America. Light brown, dark brown to purplish tan in colour and streaked with brown or black figure it takes a beautiful natural polish. Santos Rosewood was introduced to the market as a substitute for Rio Rosewood, but is now considered a valuable wood on its own merits and is most often used for architectural woodworking, knife handles and high-end furniture. East Indian or Ceylon Satinwood (Chloroxylon swietenia) comes from Sri Lanka island and is a very appreciated wood throughout the last centuries. The tree reaches no spectacular size, a length of 10 m for the stem and 50 cm diameter seem to be the maximum. The colour of the heartwood is of a delightful light to golden yellow, it is not distinctly demarcated from the sapwood. The texture is fine and even, highly lustrous, the grain is narrowly interlocked and often shows an attractive mottled figure. This appears like the shiny look of an expensive satin fabric and has given name to the wood. Although the name Citronnier or Zitronenholz sound, as if the wood is related to citrus fruit trees, it has nothing at all to do with this species, they just refer to the colour.
Sheoak (Allocasuarina fraseriana), also called cris cros oak or
lacy she oak is one of Australias most attractive timbers, the tree grows in
the West Victoria province forests among Eucalypt and Banksia trees. The wood
seems similar to European oak but is not at all related to oak. Snakewood, also called letterwood, Amourette or lettre moucheté (Piratinera guianensis) is an incredibly beautiful wood that comes from South American Guyana and Surinam. The colour is deep dark reddish brown with irregular black speckles or stripes with fine texture and high lustre, reminding of snakeskin or leopard's fur. Due to limited availability and much demand the prices for superior quality snake-wood are very high-but this unique wood is worth it! Thuya burl wood comes from the Sandarac tree (Tetraclinis articulata), a coniferous tree only growing in the Atlas mountains of northern Africa, Morocco and Algeria. The woods colour varies from a rich, lustrous golden brown to dark brown, nearly black. The eyes, perfectly round, are scattered about in some burls like the figure in bird's-eye maple; in others they are grouped as islands. Thuya burl is hard and dense with a high natural oil and resin content. Tamarind trees (Tamarindus indica) were native to tropical Africa, but have spread to all tropical regions of the world. The tree is evergreen, reaches up to 20 ms height . Tamarinds supply people with a lot of products, nearly every part of the slow growing tree is used. The heartwood is rather small, very hard, and heavy, dark red-brown to purplish-brown. The sapwood is pale-yellow, and if a tree is affected by fungus, insects or other rotting processes in the humid climate of a forest, a spalting process producing really stunning landscape-like patterns of coloration and streaking thin lines may occur, often resulting in black, pink, grey and multicoloured streaked wood. A picture of a section through a spalted log shows the tiny heartwood and the lines in the sapwood!
Brazilian Tulipwood (Dalbergia variabilis) is a colourful member
of the true rosewood family, the tree grows in the northeastern provinces of
Brazil and the nearly always small logs were shipped mainly from the seaport of Bahia, where the wood got its second name, "Bahia tulipwood" from. The wood
itself is very hard and dense, its colour (not durable under strong sunlight)
varies from pale pink- yellow- red with a striped figure to salmon-red, even
violet shades. Adding to the vibrant color is the wood’s natural lustre. The wood‘s colour varies from a rich, lustrous golden brown to dark chocolate brown and is very durable and shows very fine figure when taking a close look at. It is a seldom traded wood and a very attractive for nearly any item!
European walnut (Juglans regia) grows in nearly whole middle-
and southeast Europe, although beautiful figured walnut is a rather scarce wood:
only about 5-10 percent of the mature trees have the typical dark brown
heartwood with black streaks, that is priced very high- often as high as exotic
tropical woods. Yellow Box (Eucalyptus melliodora) comes from southeast Australia and is a tree producing very fine, hard and extremely durable wood. During blossom the magnificent tree of about 30 to 40 m height is covered with thousands of honeylike smelling flowers. The wood is used for Didgeridoos and other fine applications. When it is available as figured burls, it is highly prized and desired for crafts and fine items like pens.
Ziricote (Cordia dodecandra) comes from Mexico, Guatemala and
Belize and is a considerably small tree. The logs are seldom over 40-50 cm in
diameter traded, thus the wood is pretty rare and not easy to find. The sapwood
is creamy white, the heartwood colour ranges from tobacco brown to dark brown or
nearly black with spidery black pigment lines that often overlap, forming
landscape figures or spider webbings. Ziricote is the most dramatic looking
member of the Cordia genus. |
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