Wooden Picture Frames 

 

Why Wood ?

Wooden picture frames have always been popular, but even with the choice of materials toaday, wood scores highly over other materials for making picture frames in two key areas: versatility and aesthetics. 
There’s very little that you can’t make out of wood  and here at PictureFrames, we have always prided ourselves on having greater carpentry skills than yer average framer. So when it comes to making a frame in two parts because it wouldn’t fit into the building then joining it seamlessly inside - or to routing out the back of frames to precisely fit a television - or to making weird shaped frames out of a single piece of mdf: we’ve done it. Then there’s the finishing: wood can be finished in an infinite number  of different ways from painting to staining to varnishing to gilding.
Being a natural material, wood has a beauty that no laminate or other fake finish can ever truly capture - whether left in its natural state to age gracefully or stained , varnished, waxed etc to enhance it; if you want that natural look it’s got to be the real thing.

Finished wood/ Unfinished wood

When you come to choose a frame on the website you will see that we have categorised the mouldings by colour. Finished Woods and simulated wood finishes will be found in “Dark Brown” or “Pale Brown”, and unfinished under “Natural Wood - untreated”. The natural woods are all just that - see below for which is best for what. Under the other categories, if the code begins with 3 (e.g. 3014 Cushion - Beech), then it is a simulated wood but if begins with a letter its a finished wood.

Types of Wood

Under “Natural Wood - untreated”, you will find a range of different species: here's’ a brief guide  to which is best for what:

 

Ash: one of the most popular timbers for picture frames: pale in colour with a very pronounced and distinctive open grain, ideal for staining and liming, nice untreated but can sometimes be a bit too yellow...	C076 Flat Ash
Beech: pale pink in colour, strong and stable, very regular close grain usually with a unique fleck which gives it away when stained etc. Great left untreated but can be stained, varnished etc...	I096 Flat Beech
Oak: timeless and perennially popular for picture frames as well as everything else, oak is a beautiful grey beige colour which ages to a gorgeous rich honey: think traditional floors, old school desks and church pews. Oak is strong and stable and with it’s in imitable flowing open grain and distinctive fleck, ideal for all types of finish, but lovely in its raw state..	F832 Flat Oak
Obeche: the most widely used timber in picture framing and picture frame manufacture as it is usually highly consistent and free from knots . Like pine, the name covers a range of species of varying quality. Pale cream in colour going a bit more yellow with age. Very straight with an even featureless open grain. Best finished as it’s natural colour can be a bit too yellow and there is little interest in the grain. Usually quite soft so drinks up stain, needs polish as well as wax to achieve a decent sheen. Great for painting, gesso etc.	D079 Obeche Cushion
Pine: the name covers a range of species such as Redwood, Southern Yellow, cedar, Douglas Fir etc: in fact is interchangeable with the description “softwood” which says nothing about how dense it is but that it comes from a coniferous tree (a hardwood is from a deciduous tree even though like obeche it may be fairly soft). Our pine mouldings are joinery grade Redwood and the grain is the well known stuff of 1970s kitchens. Pine is relatively cheap and often looks it unless finished well. With careful finishing, it is possible to bring the distinctive flowing grain up beautifully; and as it is a closed grain it is easy to obliterate the grain altogether with paint etc. The potential downside is that it is prone to moving i.e. expanding/ contracting with temperature or atmospheric changes - this in turn can lead to warping or the opening up of picture frame corners; to try and avoid this, our frames are glued as well as pinned and our natural profiles are chosen to be less liable to open.	C068 Pine Reverse
Tulip: the timber from the poplar tree - generally known as tulip. Very attractive closed grain but often not appropriate for lighter stains and waxes etc because of frequent greenish marking - great for painting, gesso etc
Cherry: lovely grain and beautiful rich pale red colour - richer than beech and more interesting grain. Hard and strong. Great just waxed or lacquered.
Maple: lovely grain similar to cherry and walnut, pale off white colour unspoilt by the yellowness of ash, pine etc. Very hard and strong. Great just waxed or lacquered but good for painting etc
Walnut: varied and characterful grain and beautiful rich brown colour. Hard and strong. Great just waxed or lacquered.
Mahogany: proper Brazilian mahogany is no longer available unless from reclaimed timber. We use Sapele which is very similar with the deep red colour and the open grain, or Iroko which stains to a perfect match for old mahogany. With careful staining and polishing, Obeche can do a good job too.

Environmental considerations

If it is properly forested timber is the most environmentally friendly building material: it’s cultivation keeps forests alive acting as a carbon sink and producing oxygen, and at the end of its life it will rot down to be the coal of the future.
The practice of consistently planting more trees than you cut down is called “sustained yield afforestation” and all of our suppliers abide by the rules of the FSC and PEFC which are the organisations who promote and monitor such good practice for timber sold in the UK.
Where required and given advance notice we can pr