Exotic hardwood species

Somebody usually finds an exotic species the same way: a photo online, a name like Brazilian cherry or tigerwood or ipe, and a color or grain nothing on a typical showroom rack quite matches. That is a real starting point, not a mistake, but there is a sequence worth walking through before it becomes an order, and one step in that sequence decides more than the rest of them combined.

Step one: the name that caught your eye

Exotic hardwoods get sold under a tangle of trade names, common names and botanical names, sometimes several for the same wood and sometimes one name covering more than one species depending on the supplier. That is not deception so much as how the lumber trade has always worked, but it means the name on a photo is a starting point for a conversation rather than a guaranteed specification. Write down the exact name you found, and if there is a product line or supplier attached to it, bring that too.

Step two: the hardness claim, and what to do with it

Exotic species are marketed hard on their hardness ratings, and several genuinely do rate above every common domestic species. That part is real. What deserves a second look is treating the number as the whole story, because hardness resists denting and says nothing about how well a floor conceals the wear it does take, and a dramatically hard exotic wood in a smooth, dark, high sheen finish can still look tired faster than a softer, busier domestic species. Ask for the actual rating from a spec sheet rather than a number quoted from a listing, since exotic ratings get rounded and repeated online until they drift from the source.

Step three: what daylight does to the color

This is the step people skip and regret. A number of exotic species keep changing color under normal daylight after they are installed, and the shift is not even across a room, which is why our answer on the most durable hardwood species warns that a rug can leave its own outline behind on a floor like that. What this page can add is what to do about it. Ask the supplier for a photograph of an installed floor of that species that has been down a while, not a studio shot of fresh boards, because that is the only image that shows where the color is heading. Ask what the species does specifically in a room with south facing windows, since that is where the change runs fastest and least evenly. And plan rug placement for the early part of the floor's life rather than the first weekend, because a rug that stays put while the color settles leaves nothing behind and one that gets moved around does.

Step four: the step that actually decides it, sourcing

Everything above this line is worth knowing, and none of it matters if the wood cannot be gotten. This is the step that actually decides an exotic species order for a Wentzville showroom, more than hardness, more than color, more than the name. Our solid and engineered hardwood lines run through named domestic species, and a species outside that range is a real sourcing question rather than a stock item, which means an honest answer takes a conversation rather than a guess given on the spot. Bring the exact name and, if you have it, the product or the supplier, and we will tell you plainly whether it is something we can get, and whether a domestic species already gets you closer than expected.

Step five: how a dense exotic behaves once it's in your house

Many exotic species are considerably denser than a typical domestic board, and density changes more than the hardness rating. Dense wood trades moisture with the room around it slowly, which means it takes longer to reach balance with the house it is going into, so the acclimation step matters more with a dense import than with a familiar domestic species, not less. Dense wood also behaves differently under a nail or a staple, and some exotic lines call for pre-drilling or an adhesive assist that a domestic installation would not need. None of that is a reason to avoid a species. It is a reason to have the installation method settled before the material is ordered, not after it arrives.

Step six: the domestic species doing a similar job

A fair number of exotic requests turn out to be answerable with a domestic species. Someone drawn to a wild, high contrast grain is usually describing what hickory already does, board to board, without leaving the common domestics at all. Someone chasing a deep, rich brown that needs no stain is describing walnut. Worth naming separately, because it keeps getting filed in the wrong column: acacia answers that same high contrast request, and it answers it loudly, but acacia is an imported species too, so it sits on the sourcing side of this page rather than the domestic side. None of this is a pitch to talk anyone out of the wood they actually want. It is worth knowing before a sourcing conversation starts, because sometimes the species that answers the photo is a familiar one the reader had already ruled out.