Struggling to decide which timber you’d like your new bed to be made in? All our beds can be made in any of our hardwood timbers, with a selection also available in pine. To help you in deciding which timber is right for you, we’ve put together a little guide of FAQs along with our tips and tricks on choosing the right timber for you.
The first step on most of our customers’ lists when choosing a timber is the look. The colour and tone of each wood varies. Depending on your individual taste, you may be naturally drawn to a certain wood. Maybe you prefer dark woods, or maybe you like timbers with detailed grain patterns. You can read more about the individual characteristics of each timber over on the Our Timbers page.
Generally speaking, our light-coloured woods are maple, ash and beech, and our dark-coloured woods are oak, cherry and walnut. It’s worth noting that all timbers change and develop naturally as they age. For example, cherry starts life as quite a light, pale timber, but quickly deepens to the rich reddish brown shade it’s known for. You can read more about the way timbers age in our dedicated blog post just here.
If you’re looking to create a certain style in your home, this might determine the type of wood you choose. Maybe you want to go for a Scandinavian look, in which case you may consider lighter timbers such as ash or maple. Or, if mid-century modern is your thing, darker timbers such as walnut or cherry may be more suited. Some styles can suit any colour. For example, our Japanese style beds are just as at home in light or dark timbers, depending on the look you’re wanting to create.
If you’re choosing an upholstered bed, the colour of fabric may also play a part in the wood you choose. You can find all our upholstered beds just here, and fabric samples are available on the product pages.
All our hardwoods are fairly comparable in terms of their durability. All are sturdy and can withstand the rigours of everyday life. That’s not to say that they won’t dint or mark if you caught them hard enough, but there is no one hardwood that is better at preventing this. If you have concerns in this area, the only wood we’d recommend staying away from is pine. As pine is a soft wood, its less resistant to knocks and scrapes and tends to mark easier.
Similar to the above, all our timbers are more than strong enough to support our bed frame designs. Oak is the densest timber and is often considered the sturdiest, but there isn’t a way to rank the timbers in this way, as they are all considered as strong as one another. The only reason we would recommend any additional support for your bed was if the combined weight on the bed (people + mattress) exceeds 200kg. You can contact us to discuss if needed.
We’re sometimes a little loathe to answer this one, as we feel that choosing the right timber for you is one of the best parts about selecting your NBC bed! However, if we were to nail it down, oak and walnut are the most popular choices with out customers. Although (at the time of writing), cherry is hot on their heels.
As we strive to be as sustainable as possible, we order the timber to make your bed once it’s been ordered. We only order the amount needed to make your chosen design, so we do not have sections of wood for you to choose from.
Though we can never fully guarantee the exact look of any one bed, our workshop team are very knowledgeable in this area. They choose the most aesthetically pleasing pieces of timber to be on show when making the beds.
Yes, absolutely. Our timber samples are available free of charged and despatched on a first class service. You can order them just here.
Hopefully this post has given you some insight on choosing the right timber for you, and answered some of your questions! For tips on how we like to style our handmade wooden bed frames, you can find heaps of inspiration on our Pinterest page.