Homegrown Sweet Chestnut wood really lives up to its name – strong, durable, and full of character.
While it’s often called the “poor man’s Oak,” Sweet Chestnut (Sweet, not Horse) is a worthy alternative in many situations, and certainly not “poor” in any way.
Our favourite thing about Sweet Chestnut has to be coppicing,
It’s a nod to traditional woodland practices and the old-school ways of working the forest. That said, it left uncoppiced, Chestnuts can grow into giants, producing gargantuan waney edge boards that are inspiring. Perhaps it’s the board we love best…
What’s in a name?
Sweet Chestnut, or Castanea sativa (sativa meaning “cultivated by humans”), probably earned its name because the nuts are edible – if cooked properly! It’s the same species as the European Chestnut, also known as Spanish Chestnut, Marron, or simply Chestnut.
Describing Sweet Chestnut Timber
Sweet Chestnut timber is a hardwood with a distinctive open grain, creamier colour than Oak, and occasional brown or yellow streaks, making it easy to recognise once you know what to look for. Fresh-sawn, it can resemble Oak, but it dries to a noticeably different tone.
When dry, Chestnut shows creamier shades than Oak, with occasional brown or yellow streaks caused by its natural tannins.
The open, fairly coarse grain makes Chestnut ideal for wide surfaces like tables or worktops. Combined with its dense structure and tannin content, it’s naturally durable and well suited to outdoor use.
What is Sweet Chestnut wood used for?
Sweet Chestnut wood from coppiced woodlands is also fantastic for traditional riving as it’s naturally inclined to split down the grain. It makes laths, staves, battens, hurdles, pales, rails, shakes, and all the things you can make with those things.
It’s strong and durable, so it’s great for cladding, for decking, really good for groundworks, for fencing other landscaping work. Perhaps it’s not so great as heavy structural framing timber, unless you’re making a round timber frame and then it’s an exciting prospect!
Like other fresh sawn products, Chestnut tree wood will take a finish when its surface is dry if you want to stop the weathering and silvering process. Otherwise, it will grey over time and doesn’t need any preservative treatment.
When it’s dry and machined, Sweet Chestnut timber will take finishes as any other hardwood. However, it’s always worth checking your finishes are compatible with the tannin in Chestnut wood and that your product doesn’t contain strong alkali (e.g. ammonia), which will react with tannin and darken the colour.
SWEET CHESTNUT TREE WOOD – TRADA TECHNICAL INFORMATION
Mechanical Strength: 80% that of Oak
Durability: Durable
Treatability: Extremely difficult apart from sapwood
Moisture movement: Small
Texture: Medium
Density (Kg/m3): 560
A bit about Sweet Chestnut Wood Grades
PRIME (Grade 1) as defined by Making The Grade
The following are the properties that are allowed or permitted within Prime grade Sweet Chestnut Wood:
Fully and partly intergrown knots: one ≤20mm diameter or several smaller up to a combined diameter of 20mm.
Non intergrown knots and rotten knots: occasional if measured-out.
Checks: occasional surface and occasional splits in sound knots permitted.
Shake: no
Colour: none specified, but surface stains are not generally regarded as a defect, provided that they do not penetrate into the timber. Stick-marks and other penetrating stains are not permitted.
Grain: straight or nearly straight and wavy-grain is accepted, provided that it can be regarded as a special decorative feature that will not limit the performance of the piece in its intended use.
Bark: no
Rot / insect attack: no
Warp: none specified
Wane: none specified
Sapwood: should be excluded if used externally
Dimensions
BOULES logs cut and dried for use range from 450 – 1000mm diameter and 3-6m in length, cut into thicknesses of 27, 34, 41, 54, 65, 80 and 100mm. See stocklist
BOARDS in waney edge are available in the same thicknesses as BOULES (of course!) in varying widths up to 1.0m and lengths up to 6.0m. See stocklist
STRUCTURAL fresh sawn timber is customer cut and is available in up to 300mm section dims and up to 6.0m lengths.
CLADDING, DECKING & FLOORING Chestnut tree wood all comes from the same stock as above and is available to order in standard sizes and some not so standard!
Our Sweet Chestnut Timber Stocks
At the moment we keep Chestnut stock in air dried BOULES, kiln dried waney edge BOARDS and in hand riven laths for plastering. Fresh sawn Chestnut wood for CLADDING & STRUCTURAL work.
