Wood Identification

[Svenedin]

Firstly let me introduce myself as this is my first post on the forum. I'm Stephen. I'm a doctor from Croydon, UK. I am currently renovating/restoring my house.

I have a question regarding the identification of the wood that a fire surround is made of.

This fire surround is original to my house and is from around 1902. During our tenure of the house (since 1978) it has only ever been known painted with gloss paint and it was painted by the previous occupants.

I was recently advised by a chap who came to fit some spare parts to a fire grate in another room that the fire surround in question was very likely original and also likely to be hardwood.

I decided that I would do a test strip of one of the legs. The idea was that if I found it to be pitch pine or something I didn't like then I would just paint it again. By doing a whole panel it would be easier to match back up.

I decided to use peelaway 7 as I was worried that I might wreck it with the caustic peelaway 1 if it was oak. Having stripped a cast iron fireplace a few weeks back I have found that the solvent strippers available to amateurs are now pretty useless without the methylene chloride (banned by the EU unless for industrial use and unless one has the correct documentation). Anyway, peelaway 7 does work but takes 48 hours and will need a lot of cleaning up as there is still loads of paint in the grain. Peelaway 1 would be much better because it really damages the paint and the residue can be washed out with a stiff brush (the alkali turns the oils in the paint into a soap-like goo) but if the wood is oak it could darken it badly and the same may be true if it is mahogany (which the reddish colour suggests it might be).

My question is: Can anyone help me identify the wood? It is a bit redder than the photograph shows. I will try to get some better pictures in due course. Those awful low energy light bulbs ruin the colour rendition in photographs.

 

[adidat]

hi and welcome,

hard to tell, douglas fir, pine?? doubt its mahogany


adidat

 

[Svenedin]

OK. Yes I realise the picture is dreadful. It's certainly not what my internal doors are made of. They seem to be some kind of pine that was lacquered before it was painted with gloss paint. It's a shellac lacquer that dissolves in meths. Same with the skirting boards. I can see the lacquer was a finish for many years until electrical sockets were put on and soon after came the horror of gloss paint. Under the sockets is the original finish. Anyway, I digress onto doors and skirting. The fire surround has me puzzled because it doesn't look like the wood of the doors or the skirting. Although I have only stripped a small area I have only found one very small knot so far. As I understand it, the Victorians and Edwardians didn't think much of pine and either covered it up with paint or applied paint effects to make it look like more expensive woods. Sometimes it was stained and lacquered though. If the fire surround is made of a wood that was regarded as cheap it may have been painted right from the start. In that case I am wasting my time stripping it! Seriously thought, the 1920s/30s tiles (later) in the fireplace are brown and don't go at all with the painted surround. This is why I suspect that the surrounds were not painted until gas fires were installed in the 1960s.

 

[tsg]

From the grain it does look as if it is pine or similar, I found a great site for identifying different woods

http://www.hobbithouseinc.com/personal/ ... /index.htm

find the picture you think most closely resembles what you have got and click on it. Most of them have a large number of other photo's showing various other grain patterns for the same type of wood. It's a great resource so please share it...(and no, I am in no way associated with it!!)

Paul

 

[marcus]

Looks like softwood of some kind to me too.

the 1920s/30s tiles (later) in the fireplace are brown and don't go at all with the painted surround. This is why I suspect that the surrounds were not painted until gas fires were installed in the 1960s.

People can do tasteless things at any time....

 

[hanser]

Hi Stephen

If you go down the route of paint stripping the lot use Paramose Industrial - its a traditional paint stripper for industrial use. It gets recommended here every now and again -you can check back on the 'search' facility. It is very caustic and available on Ebay amongst other sites, but not in the big sheds.

 

[AndyT]

I have a copy of "The Handyman's Book" by Paul Hasluck, published in 1903. (Also available as "Cassell's Woodworking", 1912; the material was endlessly recycled and some of it had also appeared in periodicals such as "Work") It gives a detailed insight into Edwardian taste.

The chapter on Drawing Room Furniture gives designs for fire surrounds and overmantels not dissimilar to yours. Looking at what it says about finishes I find the following:

p 718 This overmantel... looks well if made in mahogany, rosewood, oak or American walnut. If it is desired to ebonise the finished overmantel, oak should not be used; the other woods are suited for the purpose. A very good effect can be obtained by staining mahogany to "Chippendale colour" which is virtually an imitation of rosewood.

p 723 The overmantel...looks well if constructed of good pine or American whitewood and finished in white enamel with a gilt frame for the mirror...if oak or walnut is used ... finish by french polishing.

p 724 The chimneypiece... is designed for a tenant's fixture, is easily removed and is capable of readjustment to similar openings with little trouble. It may be constructed of yellow deal or basswood, which may be stained an olive green or a ruby red, to harmonise with the surrounding furniture.

So, to sum up, they were perfectly ready to use whatever wood could be got, and make it any colour they fancied!

 

[Svenedin]

Thank you very much for your replies. It is such a long time since I did woodworking at school. Once upon a time I was able to recognise commonly used woods without difficulty but now I have forgotten it all and trying to recognise wood still very mucky with paint is just too tricky for me. I do have an interest in clocks (and I restore them and often French Polish them) but they are usually hardwoods: mahogany, walnut, various fruitwoods etc. Sometimes these are covered in paint but I had decent paint stripper to hand when I did the last one.

The consensus seems to be that it is a softwood so I will now try to clean up that single panel to a decent standard and see what the family thinks of it. I might give it a rough and ready coat of shellac which will give an idea of finish. It is so easy to take shellac off and anyway it is used as knotting solution on bare wood. If it is not going to look good then it will go back under gloss for eternity. I could either keep the firesurrounds (I actually have a matching pair) and just accept that I don't like them much or I may look for reclaimed hardwood surrounds but finding a pair won't be easy.

I am grateful for the suggestion of a better paint stripper. We all know that chemicals can be dangerous especially strong caustic and powerful solvents but redering paintstripper about as effective as wallpaper paste by EU directive is surely not the answer! I can imagine that a lot of wood will be damaged by physical stripping as a result of this.

I was also very interested by the quotes from the contemporary book. I have ordered some books on Victorian/Edwardian interior design but I would never have known about "The Handyman's Book". It does confirm what I thought which is that pine or other cheaper woods were generally stained or painted and more expensive wood was French Polished but then again they seem to have done whatever they felt like to some extent......

 

[AndyT]

It's a fascinating book - 760 pages of old tools, techniques and some of the most tasteless designs imaginable!
As far as I know it's not available as a download, but there was a usable cheap reprint in the 90s which was briefly available in remainder shops, so copies are cheap and plentiful. Start at this link to Bookfinder.com to see what I mean.

As for paint stripper, the only one I've used recently was sold as a non-toxic, eco friendly option - and it worked brilliantly! It was this stuff which I bought from our local hardware shop. As with all such products, results will differ on different finishes - but I was impressed at how pleasant it was to use.

 

[Sgian Dubh]

I have a question regarding the identification of the wood that a fire surround is made of.

... This fire surround is original to my house and is from around 1902.

Based on the appearance of the wood in your second photograph-- the one with the paint stripped, with its strongly differentiated dark summer growth and pale winter growth, as well as typical joinery material used at that time, and your information that the wood looks redder in the flesh than the image indicates, it's most likely to be what's sold as redwood nowadays. Redwood is Scots pine or Pinus sylvestris. Slainte.

 

[Random Orbital Bob]

I agree totally with last post. The real tell for a coniferous origin is the grain difference between summer and winter. Deciduous trees (hardwoods) are typically much more slow growing than softwoods (coniferous ie evergreens ie pine). That's why their wood is more dense hence the name. The narrow bands are laid down during the cold season where growth is very slow, the lighter sections during the growing season. In any given year a coniferous set of growth bands will be much wider than a hardwood. The appearance on those boards is very reminiscent of the antique pines I've worked with. I've done various joinery in Victorian, Edwardian era homes and that pine is very very common in doors, skirting, picture rails, dado rails and fireplaces. It's age helps it to go a deep orange/red/yellow colour depending on finishes etc. I've rarely found oak in fireplaces and even less more exotic hardwoods

Ironically,its usually lovely quality wood. Way better than the modern Scandinavian Deal (which is very white in colour). It planes beautifully and has a wonderfully rich colour when refinished after a good cleanup. Personally I like it and preserve it wherever possible, particularly to protect the provenance of the property

 

[dickm]

Based on the last picture and what you suggest is the original date, it could well be pitch pine. This has a very big contrast between summer and winter wood, and is relatively hard. If you can't get any indentation pressing a thumbail into it, that would tend to support the idea. It was used extensively for skirtings, architraves and fire surrounds later in the nineteenth century.
Personally, I think it looks great cleaned up and varnished, but it's possibly an acquired taste.

 

[Svenedin]

Here are some better pictures. There is still paint in the grain. The bare wood is incredibly smooth.

 

[Chrispy]

One thing to bare in mind if it was made to be painted it may not have been all made from the same timber and will have filled nail holes, often filled with white putty so you may have a lot of matching up to do, on the other hand if it was made to be stained and polished then it should be quite easy to undo the paint work and repolish it.

 

[Svenedin]

That is great info Chrispy and it really does pay to ask an expert; I have found one of those nail holes you mention (it is perfectly round and looks like a drill hole) and it is filled with white putty! The putty is still like putty and I marked it with my finger nail. Perhaps the paint has stopped the putty from ever drying out. In that case it seems it was made to be painted and should stay that way. It has been fun turning house detective!

 

[dickm]

Hmm. Changed my diagnosis (are Drs allowed to do that??) having seen the closer pic. Even the stripy timber is almost certainly not pitchpine, and the moulding on the right is likely another species again (Poplar?). Which all supports the idea that it was intended to be painted.

 

[Svenedin]

Yes it looks like it was intended to be painted and I have found an almost identical fire surround which is painted in a book on Edwardian interiors. Apparently, servants were getting harder to hire and paint was used to make things easier to keep clean. Also it was the fashion to have light, bright interiors in contrast to the heavier Victorian style. Dining rooms tended to be more masculine and polished wood was still used. So my books tell me!

Anyway, my pair of painted fire surrounds will stay painted but I have a horrible 1960s fireplace in my dining room and I may just have sourced an Edwardian mahogany fire surround which is a bit tatty but should respond well to some tlc. It is French polished not painted.