What Wood Is That: A Manual of Wood Identification (Studio Book)

Rating:
Summary: Great samples. Great book.
Review: If your working on a project involving exotic woods, then this book should be added to your library. The REAL wood samples are great. The book also has very useful information about many types of wood. I find this book to be a handy reference tool and am glad to have added it to my collection.

Rating:
Summary: Focus On European Not USA Species
Review: This book is of little value for the woodworker trying to identify woods commonly used on the American continent. When the species are described (with wood samples provided) the European varieties are given to the exclusion of woods from this continent. Species vary enough from the Euopean continent to make the book of very little use in identifying American woods and can even be misleading. The grain pattern on Birch is a classic example and Birch is used a great deal on funiture.

The book is very badly outdated and lists uses for various woods not seen since the late fifties and early sixties.

Consider carefully before purchasing this book.

Rating:
Summary: Quiet and straightforward
Review: This is a very friendly and straightforward book. It starts with veneer samples (quite small, but big enough) of 40 woods and finishes with descriptions of the trees that yield these 40 woods.

In between there is quite a bit of useful information on wood, and the history of woodworking. A pretty good introduction to wood for and woodworking. This book will be only modestly useful in identification, since it is limited to naked eye observations of those 40 woods.

I browsed through the 1969 edition and it clearly is from another era (with the chainsaw just being introduced!). I can well imagine that those who equate woodworking with roaring high speed machines may find this quiet book not to their liking.