Building locally

[Means2nEnd]

The only wood I buy locally sourced is walnut because the stuff at most hardwood suppliers is commercially done in huge kilns that also steam it after they dry it. Mostly to get it to have the most consistent coloring loosing most if not all the creamy swirls of lighter and darker colors furniture makers don't want. Lots of the larger eight quarter and up is steamed to help put back some of the moisture to the outside the dry heat takes out more of and even things a bit but it doesn't take all the figuring and contrast out like walnut. Local walnut is dried but not steamed. The look of the two is night and day.

 

[JayGunn]

When I was in the hand made furniture business decades ago our wood dealers explained that for 'Firsts and Seconds,' the highest grade of walnut we could buy, sapwood was considered a grade defect, unless it was steamed. So that was the primary reason for doing it.

We used to buy some walnut from local country sawmills. The wood was more of a dark chocolate color and it often had highlights that looked a bit purple (before an amber oil finish would go on). The sapwood of this non-treated air dried wood was kind of a nasty gray color a lot of the time. In comparison the sapwood of the steamed walnut was tan and the heartwood was lighter golden brown.

To me both are beautiful, but it would be hard to color match both kinds of walnut in a single piece, whether a bass or a piece of furniture.