All about veneer furniture

Veneer furniture is a great alternative to wood products... It suits the same styles, combines with all materials, has an infinite number of patterns and colors, but unlike solid wood, veneer products are available to everyone. Consider in this article everything about veneer furniture.

Veneer furniture is a two-component industrial product consisting of a base and a veneer covering. The base material can be anything related to wood and used in the manufacture of furniture - chipboard, fiberboard, MDF, HDF, furniture board or plywood. Veneer is the thinnest cut of wood with a thickness of 1.5 to 3 mm. Combining both types of products, you get an excellent material for creating furniture.

People learned to use veneer over 200 years ago. Back in the 19th century in Germany, logs were cut into thin layers of wood using machine tools. The Germans called their products veneer, which means "wood chips" in Russian. Thin wood canvases made a splash among cabinetmakers, since it was possible to paste over cheap types of wood with veneer from expensive tropical vegetation and get beautiful furniture, significantly reducing its cost. Modern industrialists began to use veneer to improve the appearance not of the wood itself, but of the products obtained from it, that is, sheet composite material.

Veneer does not have a high value, like natural wood, but it is endowed with a number of characteristics that improve the performance properties of the material. Unlike solid wood, this product does not swell, dry out or deform. It belongs to an environmentally friendly product, imitates wood well and is inexpensive. A wide range of products allows you to purchase furniture that repeats the color and pattern of unusual varieties of trees that do not grow in our latitudes.

We have already found out that the material for creating furniture consists of a base made of small wood particles and veneer glued to it. Depending on the sawing methods, veneer is divided into several types.

• Shelled... The cut is obtained in a spiral manner. To do this, the machine is used to rotate the block-cylinder around the static blade. The cut length is more than two meters, the thickness is from 1 to 10 mm. Peeling is the most inexpensive way to obtain veneer. The source material is aspen, beech, pine, birch, alder, oak. Rotary cut veneer is mainly used to create plywood.

• Sawn... The most expensive way of sawing, leaving behind a lot of waste. Sawing round and cubic logs is carried out on a band-dividing machine. The veneer takes the form of planks with a thickness of 5 to 12 mm, with a well-traced texture. The appearance follows the cut of natural wood. For the manufacture of the material, mainly coniferous types of wood are used. Sawed veneer is used to produce bent-glued parts for designer furniture, parquet board, door leaf.

• Planed... The most demanded type of veneer from furniture manufacturers. It is made from any kind of wood - cheap or valuable (larch, Karelian birch, cedar, hornbeam, ash, pine). On machines, knives are exposed at different angles, resulting in a varied texture of the product, namely:
  • radical way allows you to get a drawing elongated along the entire length;
  • semi-radical - achieves 75% parallelism of strips;
  • tangential - annual rings run in a growing pattern, creating curved lines;
  • tangential-butt is a drawing of a variety of circles or ovals.

• Fine-line. There is one more type of products obtained on the basis of rotary cut veneer. Products made of soft wood are suitable for its production. The veneer is glued, pressed into large blanks and cut into standard elements. The material is dyed and painted, imitating the texture of expensive wood.

Veneer joining to sheets, panels, slabs, from which furniture will be made, occurs in several ways.

• Hot veneering. This option is the most common method in which the veneer and the base material are connected using an adhesive (PVA or synthetic resins).

• Membrane veneering. This process is a more expensive industrial process using a vacuum unit. The result is both a smooth and textured appearance of the material.

Manufacturers perform furniture cladding with various types of veneer. It is not difficult to choose products with the most exotic finish for your interiors. In a modern abundance of goods for any style, you can choose ready-made veneer furniture or order it according to your project. To make sure of this, we have prepared a small selection of photographs.

• Custom-made furniture for a large kitchen in the village direction.

• Composition of cabinets in classic style, covered with oak veneer and varnish.

• Veneered kitchen in a minimalist interior.

• In the kitchen provence furniture doors imitate bleached oak wood.

• Style high tech with cabinet furniture, veneered under the stone, using the fine-line technique.

• Living room in style loft contains laconic and functional furniture.

• Veneer application in an oriental interior.

• The bedroom furniture has a light finish with a simple but pleasant wood grain pattern. Perfectly supports color and texture Scandinavian style.

All furniture factories work with veneer, but we will consider the most popular ones, whose furniture really deserves attention.

• "Shatura-Furniture"... A domestic company has been pleasing us with its products for half a century. She has a network of branded stores throughout the country. The quality of the furniture has been repeatedly noted with awards at various exhibitions.
• Rival... One of the ten best factories in Russia. The furniture is presented with good design and excellent fittings.
• Pinskdrev. The largest Belarusian holding company with 130 years of experience. He became famous for the release of environmentally friendly furniture using high-quality veneer.
• IKEA... A famous Swedish manufacturer that produces affordable and diverse products based on wood, composite panels and veneers.

Those who have decided not to save on furniture can choose a product from a furniture board veneered by the membrane method. Such a shell looks like natural wood and will never part with its base, that is, it will not break and delaminate. The varnish used to cover the furniture enhances its water-repellent properties and resistance to mechanical stress. Even if the design requires a matte surface, you don't have to worry about the protective layer, the veneer undergoes special impregnations even at the stage of processing.

As for the care of veneer furniture, despite its strength, it is better not to tempt fate, namely:

• do not rub with hard brushes;
• do not use products with aggressive liquids;
• Do not put hot pots on the worktop.

For an unprofessional look, furniture made of high-quality veneer is difficult to distinguish from wood products. She can also look spectacular, rich and stylish.

• A curbstone with an unusual expressive pattern on the facade.

• The cabinet is decorated with designer furniture made of "Rosewood" veneer.

• A beautiful and laconic wardrobe with mirror inserts.

• Membrane veneer bathroom. Few decide to purchase such plumbing fixtures.

• Table in classicism style with a wood-effect finish, protected by varnish. The technique of inlaid with veneer is unusually beautiful. The drawing is made up of thin cuts of exotic trees collected from different parts of the world. The most colorful and textured timber comes from tropical vegetation. See how impressive and expensive such furniture looks.

• A coffee table with a mosaic of fragments of exotic trees.

• Exquisite dining table with wood applique.

• The drawing on the curbstone is made up of thin slabs of wood.

• An unusual piece of furniture, veneered using the fine-line technique.

• Sideboard inlaid with multi-colored veneer and decorated with carvings.

The following video talks about veneer furniture.