Thread: Recycled Timber Furnitre?

Not if you can put up with all the nail holes and dings. Why dont you go and cut down a tree and make some new furnitre?

Hi Blondie,
Recycled furniture is made primarily from old structural timbers, so you'll find alot more gum vein, insect holes, checking (cracks) than you would see in virgin furniture timber. Sometimes flooring is used, attached to a man-made substrate, and so nail holes may be evident. These are all usually considered "features" of recycled furniture.

Other than that, if you are happy with the quality of joinery and finish from your supplier, all things should be equal. I deal with a fair bit of recycled gear and I like all the feature, not to mention the density and rich colour of old timbers.

Regards,
Rusty.

Good idea but some how i think there would seem to be more nail holes then what there should be and more dings aswell.

Thank you Rusty

They said that it was from Oregon timer and was from over seas i too like the look of the nail holes and just that old look and it is all flat pack and they put it all together for you.

Yeah, alot of stuff gets distressed by the furniture maker. I'm getting used to it (do it at work) but when you've just finished flattening and finish sanding a table top it's kind of hard to hit it with a rock.

One gets over it, though...

Rusty.

My replies are getting out of sync...hope I'm making sense..

Ummm i been re reading that one trying to work it out :confused:
But dont worry it could just be me.

I use a lot of recycled timber but go to great lengths to avoid all nail holes etc, or try to fill them so they (nearly) disappear. Deliberately distressing a piece is yuppie cr@p. Shows like Shabby Chic are only designed so that interior designers can offload garbage that they've paid bugger-all for at rediculous prices to gullible wannabees. Timber is beautiful stuff, it doesn't need flogging with chains or painting with silver frost or scorching with a blowtorch.
Graeme

Yeah - can't for the life of me figure out why you'd want to pay someone to do what my kids did to our furniture over the years, for free!

What Rusty & Graeme said about holes etc & artificial distressing is generally correct. However, a few years ago there was a place in Hornsby making good quality furniture from recycled Oregon. They moved, so I don't know if they folded or just moved on.

Deliberately distressing a piece is yuppie cr@p.

True, but I'm learning to like it. Not because it's a good idea, but because it's harder than you might think. Obviously you have to make it random so it looks like it has built up over years; it should trick the eye into not noticing it.

Good for hiding ROS swirlies, too... Murder on the wrists, though, especially for us sensitive types...

Rusty.

Originally Posted by graemet

I use a lot of recycled timber but go to great lengths to avoid all nail holes etc, or try to fill them so they (nearly) disappear. Deliberately distressing a piece is yuppie cr@p. Shows like Shabby Chic are only designed so that interior designers can offload garbage that they've paid bugger-all for at rediculous prices to gullible wannabees. Timber is beautiful stuff, it doesn't need flogging with chains or painting with silver frost or scorching with a blowtorch.
Graeme

Wot he said!!!

Ross

Seems to me a conundrum here. :confused:

We have recycled timber being made into furniture. Any furniture maker with an ounce of pride would normally produce a piece that was finely finished and whilst may bear some marks of its past most if not all would be imaginativly filled and would appear as a new piece of furniture with the character and feel of well aged timber with a colour to match.

Recycled furniture made from timber is where I would expect the ding and knocks etc to be used to give the piece that aged well used look.

I suppose I can imagine that there are those that want a piece of the latter classification that has been made from materials from the former. Is that what you were referring to as Yuppie Cr@p?

If so I agree

If not get a couple of weathered old pallets, nail em together and you've got the result you wanted :confused:

Not sure I've solved the conundrum or understood what you are trying to achieve either but that happens with my Norway Blonde too

I don't think the downsides of recycled timber furniture are any different to the same item made from first-use timber. If it has been made by someone who knows what they are doing, it wont make any difference.

I have items that have been made from recycled timber but you wouldn't know it. Other items have been left so that there is no doubt the timber is recycled. It depends what you like. Whether you like the rustic look or the classical look, either can be made from recycled timber, first-use timber or a combination of both.

The only caveat is that a lot of the rustic furniture has been thrown together by people who are catering to the Newtown apartment crowd and wouldn't know quality if it was thrown at them.