Sean is drawing some interesting analogies between himself, Liz and natural cherry wood furniture today. 

Guest blogger:  Sean Henry

Editors note: Sean Henry and Liz Francese are our front line, crackerjack, Vermont-made furniture sales people.  If you’ve purchased from us before you’ve probably talked to them on the phone (and you’ve definitely received emails from them) so you’ll totally “get” Sean’s tongue-in-cheek essay on how people and cherry wood change over time.  If not, I guess you’ll just have to visit us at Stonehurst and see for yourself.

Let me explain something. When Liz and I were youngsters, we were adorable. No seriously, we were absolutely adorable. We were cute, blond, loveable, patriotic (me) and verbally expressive (Liz).  As I am sure you can see from the pictures we were the kind of kids that parents would love to pull pictures out of their wallets to show off to all their friends. But as you can also see, things change.  Well, maybe not all things change (this is where I tell you to look at both of the pictures of my favorite co-worker and see if you can find the similarities between the two pics).

Okay, so now that I have that part out of the way…  The one thing I wanted to point out — and yes I am finally getting to the point­­ — is that we both used to be blond or perhaps I should say dirty blond.  We both had a nice, light head of hair and over time it has become a darker shade of brown.  You may say to yourself, “what does any of this have to do with Cherry wood furniture?”  Well let me tell you.

Natural Cherry wood is a lot like Liz and I.  When it first arrives, it will be a light, almost dirty blond color.  The light color of new Natural Cherry wood may not be what you expect to see after looking at all the beautiful images of cherry wood furniture on our website.  Don’t worry, this will change.  Over time, Cherry wood darkens or “ripens” as it ages and as it is exposed to light.  As the Natural Cherry ripens, you will see the beauty of the wood and all its amazing characteristics come through.  You will start to see a noticeable change after just a few months. After six months to a year it will have that rich, ripe auburn color.  After that the color of the Cherry wood will change more gradually.  You can see the difference in the pictures above.

One last thing I want to point out before I stop writing this long-winded blog (I am new at this).  You have probably noticed my baby picture with the American flag and my very American red white and blue sailor suit.  I thought it would be a good reminder to everyone that our Memorial Day Sale is coming up soon.  So it might be the perfect time for some change and the perfect time to think about how our Vermont-Made, Handcrafted, ever-changing, beautiful, Natural Cherry wood furniture will look in your home!

The post Things Change and So Will Your Natural Cherry Wood Furniture appeared first on Vermont Woods Studios.

Vermont’s cherry trees are just starting to leaf out and will soon be blossoming this Spring.  It’s hard to believe that these gangly trees covered with flakey gray, scales can be transformed into some of the world’s finest cherry furniture like the Cherry Moon Bed shown above.

Spring is the time of year when the (normally homely) black cherry tree gets to dress up and strut it’s stuff.  Hard to believe isn’t it– that these gangly trees with rough, scaley bark will be transformed into beautiful flowering flora (and perhaps one day into natural cherry furniture like the Cherry Moon Bed above).

But it’s true.  In a few short weeks they will be bursting with  fragrant white and yellow blossoms which will give way to delicious black cherry fruit.  These are the trees that provide a sustainable source of wood for over half of the furniture customers purchase from our store, Vermont Woods Studios.

Interested in learning more about cherry trees and natural cherry wood furniture for your home?  We are the experts!  Check out some of the many “cherry wood” articles we’ve written over the years and give us a call to let us know if you’ve got a question we’ve yet to answer.  We’ll jump right on it!

• Cherry Wood Characteristics
• Natural Cherry Wood Furniture: What Color Is It… Really?
• Solid Cherry Wood Furniture: Is it Real?
• Cherry Wood Furniture:  Where Does It come From?
• Solid Cherry Wood Furniture: 3 Ways To Tell If It’s Real
• Natural Cherry Wood Furniture Characteristics: Grain Variations
• Natural Cherry Wood Furniture Characteristics: Color
• Natural Cherry Wood Furniture Characteristics: Mineral Deposits
• Solid Cherry Furniture: 18 American Made Collections From Vermont

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High quality, real solid hardwood furniture is expensive, no doubt about it.   But customers are still buying this cherry and walnut bedroom furniture set and other hardwood furniture pieces.  Their reasons have to do with longevity, value and beauty.

Top 3 Reasons To Buy Hardwood Furniture

High quality, real solid hardwood furniture is expensive, no doubt about it.  It’s not for everyone.  College students are more likely to find suitable furniture at IKEA- that’s for sure.  But if you landed on this blog post, you’re probably a homeowner looking to feather your nest for the long term, right?  Well we talk to people like you everyday and so we’ve learned a few things about why our customers are looking to buy hardwood furniture.

First – It’s Beautiful

Check out our cherry and walnut hardwood bedroom furniture set.  You just don’t get this kind of smooth, refined patina on pine, spruce or other soft wood furniture.  When hardwoods are sanded properly and finished with a clear, non-toxic lacquer or hand-rubbed natural oil, you can run your hands over the wood and it almost feels like skin.  No softwood, metal or plastic furniture can give the same tactile sensation that high quality, handmade hardwood furniture does.

Second – It’s Durable and Lasts a Lifetime

Hardwoods like cherry, walnut, maple and oak wood are from deciduous trees that grow slower than coniferous softwood trees like pine, spruce, larch and fir.  Thus hardwoods are typically more dense, heavy, durable and, well… hard.  They also are fairly non – resinous and close grained so they don’t leak sap and split like pine does.  If you take care of your hardwood furniture it will hold up beautifully for many years, even many generations.  We are confident enough in our hardwood furniture to back it with a lifetime guarantee.

Third – It’s a Natural, Organic Part of a Healthy Home

Many people, especially those with young children are looking for natural, organic furniture to be a part of their healthy homes.  They often talk to us about where their furniture comes from too.  Hardwood furniture that’s made in America is typically built with wood that’s sustainably harvested from well-managed American forests.  Families enjoy breaking bread over a dinner table that’s made in harmony with nature.

Bonus Reason!  It’s Economical in the Long Run

OK, I said Top 3 Reasons, but here’s a fourth that I just can’t walk away from.  In the long run, high quality hardwood furniture is cheaper to buy than other types of furniture– even IKEA’s.  Consider how many times you’ll have to buy a bedroom set or dining furniture over your lifetime if you’re always buying something cheap.  We’ve had lots of customers who tell us they’ve been sleeping on a mattress on the floor for a few years while they save up to buy a high quality hardwood bed.  I can relate to that.

What are your reasons for searching for hardwood furniture?  Let us know in the comments section below or on our Facebook!

The post Hardwood Furniture appeared first on Vermont Woods Studios.

Which Type of Hardwood Furniture Is Best For Your Bedroom, Dining Room or Home Office?

If you’re looking for hardwood furniture, there’s a good chance you’re narrowing your wood choices down to the most popular and plentiful species grown here in America such as cherry, maple, oak and walnut.  These prized hardwoods are grown sustainably here in the USA with Vermont and New England being a favorite source for many woods.

We like these species because they are well suited to fine furniture making by virtue of their color, strength, hardness, grain patterns and workability.  They are also readily obtainable in our local and regional area, making them a sustainable choice.  Often our furniture makers will offer two-tone combinations of these hardwoods creating a custom, artisan look and feel to your furniture.

The photo above shows Copeland Furniture’s SoHo Bedroom Set in solid maple and walnut hardwoods.  This striking two-tone wood combination has become a best seller in our metropolitan markets, particularly Manhattan, Los Angeles and San Francisco.  Homeowners appreciate the modern, contemporary sensibilities of the SoHo solid hardwood design as well as the fine detail and craftsmanship that goes into every custom, made to order piece.

SoHo furniture is also offered in a two-tone walnut and cherry design.  Which of these hardwood combinations would look best for your bedroom furniture?

The post Hardwood Furniture: Cherry, Maple, Oak or Walnut? appeared first on Vermont Woods Studios.

Often customers come to us looking specifically for fine wood furniture that's handmade in America from sustainably harvested wood.

At last!  Vermont is becoming know as the Fine Furniture Capital of America.  The Green Mountain State has been the home to fine woodworkers for over 200 years.  Plus our state provides
the world's finest furniture making material – solid hardwood.

Furniture makers in Vermont create bedroom, home office and dining room furniture using American Black Cherry,
Sugar Maple, American Black Walnut, Oak and other hardwoods from the Northern Forest.

Vermont designs and crafting techniques highlight the natural beauty of wood such that our furniture is a reflection of the forest it came from.   Forests
cover nearly 80% of Vermont's landscape and we harvest wood at a rate that's less than the rate at which our forest is growing– a good measure of sustainability! 

At Vermont Woods Studios we're proud to live in a place where people cherish and protect their
natural resources – our forests, meadows, pastures, rivers, lakes and streams.  And we're happy to be able to bring you the fruits of that green lifestyle:  Vermont's handmade hardwood furniture.  Like us on Facebook if you agree!

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Dennis took this picture of a black cherry tree on his property in New Hampshire. Our cherry wood furniture typically comes from PA though, which has soils and climate more ideally suited to growing black cherry trees.

Heather Barrett mentioned the other day that many customers are coming
to us by way of Google when they're searching for answers to questions
like "where does cherry wood come from"? 

At Vermont Woods
Studios we feel it's important to provide detailed information about
where your furniture comes from.  We want customers to know that our
wood is all sustainably harvested and that forest conservation is a fundamental part of our mission.

We source as much wood as we can locally, preferably right here in Vermont. Cherry wood
however isn't a big component of the Green Mountain Forest.  There are a few
cherry trees here and there across Vermont, but Pennsylvania is really
the Cherry Capitol of the world and that's where we get most of our
cherry wood. It is arguably the finest cherry wood on earth and is
prized for its lovely red color, grain and luster.

Fortunately in 1995 the state of Pennsylvania had the foresight to protect and
preserve a great deal of their cherry wood resources.  They committed to
maintaining the state forest system sustainably and began green
certifying it, by the Forest Stewardship Council, FSC.

FSC is considered
the gold standard in third party certifications of forests so we can be
confident that the forests providing our cherry wood will be around to
enjoy for many generations… just like our cherry wood furniture.

The post Where Does Cherry Furniture Come From? appeared first on Vermont Woods Studios.

This high end Vermont Shaker chest and nightstand are handmade with solid cherry wood, and cherry veneers that are used in the case sides and backs.

Yesterday I wrote about our solid cherry furniture so today I wanted to follow up with a post about the furniture we carry that incorporates cherry veneers. 

Sometimes customers come to us, initially averse to veneer but once they take a closer look they often change their minds.  I realize veneers have been given a negative connotation by companies that stick them on particle board to make cheap furniture. 

But did you know that premium quality, high end veneers are used by some of the world's most skilled furniture makers to add artistic flair and style to their work?

This is the case with the following six high end furniture collections:

Cherry Moon Furniture

Vermont Shaker Furniture

American Shaker Furniture

Copeland Sarah Shaker Furniture

Copeland Monterey Collection

Copeland Berkeley Collection

These furniture collections are made with all solid cherry wood except for the sides and backs of case goods.  Real wood veneer is used for case goods (chests, dressers, cabinets, night stands) sides and backs for esthetic and structural design reasons.  The pieces are made with frame and panel type construction and the use of solid wood in this design might cause the panels to warp in conditions of changing humidity.

As solid wood furniture specialists at Vermont Woods Studios, we spend a lot of time discussing the specifics of solid wood versus veneered construction methods with our customers.  Details for each of our collections are found in our Construction Details pages.  We welcome your comments and questions either below, on our Facebook, by phone or in person at our Vernon VT showroom.

The post Cherry Veneers: Six Furniture Collections That Bring Out Their Best appeared first on Vermont Woods Studios.

We've had Copeland's entire collection up since the start of 2012 but customers were looking for an easier way to build bedroom sets and compare pricing for different combinations of chests, dressers, beds, night stands and mirrors.  Now you can use the drop-down menus on this sets page to price out dozens of options for your Astrid Bedroom Set.  

I'm looking for feedback to see if this kind of presentation is helpful to you.  Let us know in the comments section below or on our Facebook.  Thanks!

The post Cherry Bedroom Furniture Sets: Meet Copeland’s “Astrid” appeared first on Vermont Woods Studios.

Whereas most of the big "American" furniture companies have outsourced their wood furniture manufacturing to Asia and Latin America, Vermont companies (with the exception of Ethan Allen, unfortunately) have remained here in the USA. 

Vermont cherry furniture is made to a higher standard and it's still made from real, solid American black cherry wood.  In contrast, many of the well known "American" furniture companies from North Carolina now use Asian woods like rubberwood which they stain and call "cherry".

So it's no wonder that customers come to us with many questions as they seek to find and purchase authentic American black cherry wood furniture.  I thought I'd round up five of our previous blog posts written in response to customer questions about "cherry wood furniture" in hopes of streamlining your research on the subject.  Feel free to post your own questions and comments below or on our Facebook. 

1. Natural Cherry Wood Furniture Characteristics: Color

2. Natural Cherry Wood: Where Does Your Furniture Come From?

3. Solid Cherry Wood Furniture: Is it Real?

4. Natural Cherry Wood Furniture Characteristics: Mineral Deposits

5. Natural Cherry Wood Furniture Characteristics: Grain Variations

The post Cherry Furniture: Top Five Things To Know Before You Buy appeared first on Vermont Woods Studios.

Copeland's Berkeley Desk is handmade in Vermont of solid cherry wood.  It can be ordered with or without the organizer & Return.  A versatile corner workstation with plenty of room to spread out and strategize about your future.

When I started Vermont Woods Studios Fine Furniture I was working out of my home office and seven years later I still spend a good part of my workday here.  So I'm always interested to see what new furniture is coming out for home offices.

Copeland Furniture has recently brought out a couple new workstations:  the Sarah Modular Corner Desk with Rolling File and Return and the Berkeley Desk w/ Organizer & Return shown here.

These solid wood workstations are designed in an "L" shape to fit in a corner space but they are modular and versatile so you can change them around as your needs change.  I've seen the return desk used as a sofa table and it worked beautifully.

Check them out.  A handmade, solid wood workstation in your office upgrades the whole experience of working at home.

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