Wood - Beautiful, Organic & Eco-Friendly!

Wood is one of the most useful materials in the world and has many different uses, because it's strong and versatile. 

Wood is available as hardwood or softwood but these descriptions don't always refer to the actual hardness or softness of the wood, which can be confusing.

 Beech Tree (Hardwood)

Hardwoods are from broad leaved (deciduous) trees, such as beech, birch, mahogany, maple, oak, teak and walnut and lose their leaves in the autumn.

Softwoods on the other hand are from evergreen (coniferous) trees that have needles and cones throughout the year and include cypress, fir, pine, spruce and redwood.

Pinewood Forest (Softwood)

Generally, hardwoods are harder than softwoods but this is not always the case. For example, linden wood and alder wood which Polmac (UK) Ltd uses as base woods, because they're ideal for staining wood boxes, are actually hardwoods that are comparatively soft and lightweight.

Many hardwoods have beautiful grain character and are used for making wooden boxes and furniture, as well as for decorative woodwork.

Softwoods often come from trees that are tall and straight and are used extensively in the construction industry but can also be used in wooden box making, if a tougher and more durable material is required.

The structure of wood determines its appearance, how it behaves and what it's used for. 

There are many tree varieties with a wide range of properties that are different to materials such as metals, plastics and ceramics.

These materials have a fairly uniform inner structure that makes them behave exactly the same way in all directions. Wood however has different properties in different directions, due to its natural, annual growth ring structure.

If properly treated and preserved wood will last a long time before it begins to deteriorate. However, because wood is an organic material, it's subject to the natural forces of decay, such as fungus and insects that will gradually attack its structure and eventually reduce it to dust.

People learned to use wood for practical and decorative purposes from the earliest times. Today, it's still a very popular material and is particularly admired for its natural, organic and eco-friendly properties.

Forestry can be 100% sustainable but random, unregulated logging can seriously damage the environment, whether it's to clear a tropical rainforest or to selectively cut down mature trees in an old woodland.

Trees provide important habitats for many other species and help to increase bio-diversity. If managed in a sustainable way, forestry is a great example of how people can live in perfect harmony with the environment and benefit from it. 

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Plywood v Solid Wood - The Pefect Combination!

Polmac (UK) Ltd uses a combination of solid, natural wood and plywood in the manufacture of it's customized, wood presentation boxes.

 

Plywood is essentially a wood product made from multiple layers of thin solid wood that are glued together to form a panel of a specified thickness. The layers are rotated so that the grain direction in one ply is at right angles relative to the adjacent layer. This increases the strength and dimensional stability of the plywood.

Plywood is most commonly manufactured in thicknesses of approximately 5mm to 19 mm. A standard sheet of plywood measures 1.2 m wide by 2.4 m long, although over sized plywood, can also be ordered.

Harrods Wine Cases (Made from a combination of solid wood and plywood)

Plywood is made from softwoods and hardwoods and is available in a number of grades. For example, 'A' grade plywood is practically free from all defects, whereas 'X' grade plywood has plenty of knots, knotholes, cracks and other defects.

The choice of plywood grade would naturally depend upon the usage. Where specified, only the best 'A' grade plywood is used in Polmac wood presentation boxes.

In large presentation boxes, Polmac (UK) Ltd often uses a combination of plywood and solid wood. Plywood is used for lids and bases where the surface area is large, in order to prevent warping. The sides of large Polmac wood boxes are usually made from solid wood, unless otherwise specified, as they are usually shallow and are stiffened and restrained by the lid and base panels.

Solid wood planks are sawn from logs, then cured outdoors and / or kiln dried. The drying process reduces the moisture content of the wood and increases its strength and dimensional stability. However, even after kiln drying, large solid wood pieces can still experience some shrinkage in changing atmospheric conditions particularly humidity. Careful monitoring of the moisture content is therefore necessary.

Solid wood is also graded depending upon whether it's a softwood or a hardwood.

Plywood is used when a sheet material is required that is not susceptible to cracking, shrinking, or warping, or where curved surfaces are required, such as round hamper boxes or hat boxes. In these circumstances using birch ply is ideal!

Polmac (UK) Ltd uses natural wood, in the manufacture of it's wood presentation boxes not only for it's intrinsic strength and stiffness but also because of it's beauty and aesthetic quality. Where there is the possibility of movement, high grade plywood is used.

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