Let’s be honest, the obsession with flawlessness is wearing thin.

For decades, the industry has leaned toward a particular kind of beauty in timber — clean, consistent, controlled. Somewhere along the way, we started asking wood to behave like plastic: predictable, polished, and repeatable. But real timber doesn’t work like that. And that’s exactly why it’s worth choosing.

We don’t need another material that looks like everything else. We need materials that feel real. That carry weight. That tell a story.

Timber isn’t beautiful in spite of its character. It’s beautiful because of it. Those veins, knots and tonal shifts aren’t defects; they’re evidence. Of growth. Of seasons. Of something alive.

‘Select Grade’ upheld as the ideal, but at what cost?

This pursuit of perfection doesn’t come cheap. When Select Grade becomes the gold standard, anything that doesn’t fit that narrow visual spec gets sidelined as inferior. Timber is too often downgraded or excluded, not because it isn’t strong or durable, but because it doesn’t look the part.

That creates real consequences, especially here in Australia. It limits the material available for premium use. It drives up cost and complexity. And it reinforces an aesthetic that doesn’t reflect the nature of our forests — or the future of sustainable design.

Nature doesn’t do uniform

In parts of the world where timber comes from fast-growing plantations — like North America or Russia — uniformity is easier to achieve. But Australian hardwoods tell a different story.

Our native hardwoods are shaped our unique climate and ecology. That means Select Grade, with its demand for visual uniformity, is genuinely rare here. And that’s not a flaw — it’s a reflection of the landscape, and an opportunity to work with materials that embody authenticity and resilience.

when Select is the only grade we ask for, we risk losing the character — and the sustainability — of what makes timber… timber.

What are we really grading for?

Timber grading isn’t always about how strong a piece of wood is. In fact, AS 2796 focuses entirely on visual characteristics. And for many applications, it’s those aesthetic features that drive value.

Here’s how the visual grading system typically works under AS 2796:

Select Grade: Clean and uniform, with minimal natural features.
Standard Grade: Allows moderate features such as gum veins and knots.
Feature Grade: Embraces the full range of natural characteristics, including larger or more frequent features.

So while other grades exist, it's Select that continues to dominate specifications — pushing more expressive, sustainable options to the margins.

Where value gets decided

Grading happens early in the supply chain—usually at the mill, right after the timber is sawn. But what gets graded as “valuable” is shaped much further down the line.

Specifiers might be downstream of grading, but their preferences influence what’s considered valuable upstream. If Select is always in demand, mills will push to meet that spec, even if it means discarding usable material.

The reality? Only a small fraction of milled hardwood meets the strict visual criteria for Select—not because it’s stronger, but because it’s smoother. In prioritising visual purity, we’ve created a system that undervalues the vast majority of what our forests can actually provide.

Rejected by the grading system. Reclaimed by design.
The STAY Stool by SKEEHAN is now available exclusively in our range of upcycled timbers.

Why Select Grade is Scarce in Australia (and why that matters)

Grading expectations don’t exist in a vacuum. They vary depending on the region and the species being used. In countries like the US, Canada, or Russia, fast-growing plantation softwoods tend to be more uniform in appearance. That makes it easier to produce large volumes of Select Grade timber.

But in Australia, it’s a different story. Our native hardwoods are much slower growing, denser, and more naturally feature-rich. That means Select Grade timber — especially in volume — is genuinely scarce. Not because our timber isn’t strong or beautiful, but because it doesn’t meet an arbitrary aesthetic standard.

So if you're specifying Select in an Australian hardwood species, just know: you're asking for the rarest slice of the log. Not stronger, not more durable — just smoother looking, and a whole lot harder to come by.

What Shapes the System?

Where does the problem really lie? Is the grading system the problem, or the market expectations driving them?

The truth is, it’s systemic. The way timber is graded, processed, sold, and specified — it’s all connected. The Australian Standard for appearance grading (AS 2796) reflects long-held assumptions about what timber should look like. Clean. Uniform. Free of the natural features that make timber, well… timber.

But those assumptions didn’t appear out of nowhere. They’ve been shaped by decades of consumer expectation, commercial pressure, and imported norms — often from parts of the world where Select Grade is more readily available due to species or forestry practices.

Here in Australia, we’re working with naturally feature-rich, slow-grown hardwoods. But the pressure to meet a Select Grade visual spec persists — and it’s causing perfectly good timber to be undervalued, underused, or excluded altogether. That’s not just inefficient; it’s unsustainable.

Changing the Narrative

So where does change really start? It turns out, the power sits downstream and a big part of the solution lies with those who specify.

Change is shaped by design decisions.
photo: Erin Fairmaid @hehedesign

Because you’re not just choosing materials. You’re shaping demand. What you ask for sends signals upstream: to mills, to processors, to foresters. When Select is the only grade you’re willing to consider, the whole system bends to meet that expectation, often at the cost of efficiency, sustainability, and beauty.

But when you specify differently, when you celebrate natural variation, when you look beyond the smoothest surface — you shift the story. You change what’s seen as valuable.

Timber isn’t a blank canvas. It brings its own history, texture and presence. Specifiers who embrace that aren’t just selecting a material — they’re inviting a story to be part of the design.
Design: HeHe Design | Builder: Carland Construction | Photography: Marnie Hawson

The Cost of Chasing Perfection

Select Grade isn’t stronger or more durable than Feature Grade. It’s simply cleaner looking — fewer gum veins, fewer knots, less colour variation. In other words, we’re rejecting timber not because it can’t do the job, but because it doesn’t look how we expect it to.

That means huge volumes of perfectly usable wood are undervalued, or excluded entirely from premium applications. All because it doesn’t match a visual standard that says timber should look smooth, even, and “perfect.”

But real wood isn’t perfect. It grows with seasons, storms, and soil. And that’s what makes it worth working with.

The Beauty in the Story

At Crafted Hardwoods, we do things a little differently. We start with timber resources the industry often sees as low-grade or low-value — the ones that currently don’t make the cut for premium applications. We’re not the kind of people to sweat over a knot. We believe that seeing beauty differently leads to doing things differently. It means honouring the material for what it is, not what it isn’t. And it means finding purpose not just in the product, but in the process — in upcycling, in efficiency, and in the stories the material carries with it.

Natural features make each piece of timber unique. Knots, gum veins, and colour variations aren't imperfections—they're the fingerprints of nature, telling the story of the tree's life.

By embracing these characteristics, we not only honour the tree's journey but also promote sustainability by using more of the harvested timber. This approach reduces waste and acknowledges the inherent beauty in every piece of wood.

Timber once graded out of high-end projects now proudly front and centre.
Design: The Mill Architecture & Design | Builder: MPA | Photography: Rusty Crawshaw

A Call to Redefine Beauty in Timber

As a designer, you shape how materials are seen and valued. So this is an invitation to look closer, specify differently, and make room for the kind of beauty that doesn’t need to be polished out. The kind that stands for something.

Because if we want a more sustainable future, it starts with seeing value where others don’t. And choosing timber that reflects the world as it really is — textured, honest, and full of character.

Why perfect timber doesn’t make perfect sense.