The timbers we keep on the rack

Four timbers cover everything on the list, so the rack holds oak, ash, beech and walnut and nothing else. Each one is described here by the way it works under a plane and a saw, rather than by the way it looks in a photograph. Weights are given at twelve per cent moisture content, which is where a kiln-dried board sits once it has settled indoors.

Boards reach us kiln-dried to between eight and ten per cent. They are stickered on edge with 20 mm battens between every layer, stood clear of the wall, and left for a fortnight before anything is marked. That fortnight is when a plank does its arguing, so the ones that bow or twist are found on the rack rather than at the saw.

What we buy, and the thicknesses we hold

Timber is bought in the sawn thicknesses of 26, 32, 38 and 52 mm, since each one finishes to a size on the list with enough left for squaring. A 20 mm serving board comes out of 26 mm sawn stock, and a 32 mm carving board out of 38 mm. Widths run from 150 mm up to 300 mm, and anything wider than the rack carries is glued up as a panel.

Boards are bought through-and-through wherever the yard offers it, so a single plank gives both quartersawn and flat-sawn stock from the same tree. The quartersawn part of the board goes into carving boards and wide riser tops, since rings standing upright hold a face flat. The flat-sawn part, with its cathedral figure, goes into serving boards where the movement is easier to live with.

Every plank is looked over for shake, for wandering grain and for pin knots before it is priced into a job. Knots that sit inside the marked-out area are cut round, which is why the yield sum on the front page sometimes gives one piece more than the plank actually delivers.

Each timber, and what it does under the tool

European oak

Quercus robur

Oak is the heaviest of the four and the most open-grained, so it takes weight without flexing and holds an edge detail crisply. It is hard work at the plane and rewards a sharp iron, which is why we thickness it in shallow passes. The open pores drink the first oil coat quickly, so an oak board darkens more between the first and second coat than the other three.

We pick oak for carving boards, for standard risers and for anything asked to stay put on a desk. Tannin in the timber reacts with iron, so an oak board left wet under a steel pan will mark blue-black, and that mark is why oak boards go out with flooded ends and a full three coats.

Weight: about 720 kg per m³
Kept in: 26, 32 and 38 mm sawn
Picked for: Carving boards, risers

European ash

Fraxinus excelsior

Ash is pale, long-grained and springy, so it machines cleanly at 20 mm and stays stiff across a 560 mm run. The grain is straighter than oak and easier to read, which is why a long serving board almost always starts as ash. It sands to a smooth face quickly and shows the sanding scratches just as quickly, so the last pass runs along the grain with a light hand.

Ash takes oil evenly and stays pale under it, so a finished board keeps the light colour it had on the bench. We pick ash for long serving boards, for standard risers where a lighter piece is wanted, and for any size that has to span without support.

Weight: about 700 kg per m³
Kept in: 26 and 32 mm sawn
Picked for: Long serving boards, risers

European beech

Fagus sylvatica

Beech is close, even and almost without figure, so it reads as a plain working surface and puts nothing between the eye and the food. It is the timber we route into, since a groove cut across beech leaves a clean wall with no tear-out at the corners. It is also the busiest mover of the four across its width, which is why beech boards are cut from the quartersawn part of a plank wherever we can.

We pick beech for serving boards, for carving boards where a quiet face is wanted, and for tray bases that have to stay flat under a load. It takes oil with very little colour change, so a beech board a year old still looks close to the day it left the bench.

Weight: about 720 kg per m³
Kept in: 26, 32 and 38 mm sawn
Picked for: Grooved boards, tray bases

American black walnut

Juglans nigra

Walnut is the softest and the darkest of the four, and it is the steadiest across its width. It cuts sweetly, planes without chipping and takes a mitre cleanly, which is why the docking trays are built from it. Being softer, it marks under a knife more readily than oak, so we keep walnut off the carving boards and on the desk instead.

Colour shifts as walnut ages, moving from purple-brown towards a warmer mid-brown in daylight. The oil coat deepens it straight away, so a walnut tray leaves the bench darker than the blank it came from and then lightens slowly through its first year.

Weight: about 640 kg per m³
Kept in: 26 and 38 mm sawn
Picked for: Docking trays, wide riser tops

Matching a timber to the job in hand

Where an order leaves the timber to us, this is the order we work through. Read it as the reasoning behind a choice rather than a rule, since a particular plank sometimes settles the question on its own.

The timber we reach for first, and the property that decides it
The job	First choice	What decides it
Carving board with a groove	European oak	Weight under the knife, crisp groove walls
Serving board, 400 mm	European beech	Quiet face, clean routing, even colour
Serving board, 560 mm	European ash	Long straight grain, stiff across the run
Laptop riser, standard	European oak	Mass holds the riser still on a desk
Laptop riser, wide	American black walnut	Steady across 260 mm, dark against a screen
Docking tray	American black walnut	Cuts cleanly at 12 mm, takes a fine mitre

Send a size in millimetres and the job it is for, and we will name the timber we would cut it from. Where two of the four would do equally well, we say so and let the colour decide. The movement table on the front page is the other half of that conversation, since it shows what each timber does across its width once a kitchen warms up.