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Ash wood has a variety of different characters, mostly light with often a silky texture to the grain, but in the older denser wood, it turns darker (see above), and in parts takes on a completely different colour and pattern known as “olive ash” because of it’s similarity to olive wood (see below) . Infact ash comes from the same family of trees as the olive tree. Rarer still are highly contrasting dark strands with an almost greeny colour.
Ash die-back is now widespread in our area of Norfolk, and it will cause a discolouration to the wood where it has been infected by the fungus, which discolours the wood a darker grey hue. |
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Below is a particularly remarkable piece of planked ash on a coffee table I have just finished, showing a complete variety of characters: Very pronounced spalting (the distinctive black lines), patches of olive ash in the middle, and middle on the left side, even some ripple-back which is more often found in woods such as sycamore and maple. |
