The Shaker furniture wood. The wood that ages from pale pink-tan to a deep warm reddish-brown over the first six months of UV exposure, then deepens further over decades. Eastern US hardwood from the wild black cherry tree (the same tree that drops the pits the wildlife eats), milled into furniture lumber primarily in Pennsylvania, New York, Ohio, West Virginia. The Shakers built their canonical furniture in cherry; Sam Maloof built rocking chairs in it; the entire mid-century American studio-furniture movement (Nakashima especially) used cherry as a primary medium. The defining experience of cherry furniture is patina — a freshly-built cherry table is light and almost rosy, the same table six months later is amber-brown, the same table thirty years later is a deep heirloom red. Buy from Rockler / Woodcraft / regional hardwood dealers; the supply is sustainable and FSC-certifiable.
Prunus serotina, family Rosaceae. Density 530–600 kg/m³ (12 percent MC). Modulus of rupture 85–95 MPa. Modulus of elasticity 10.0–11.5 GPa. Compression parallel to grain 47–52 MPa. Shrinkage radial 3.7 percent / tangential 7.1 percent (moderate — more movement than mahogany or teak under humidity cycling). Janka hardness ~4200 N (950 lbf). Color: heartwood pale pinkish-brown freshly milled, darkening rapidly under UV to medium reddish-brown over weeks-to-months and deepening over years; sapwood pale yellow-white, distinct from heartwood. Grain typically straight, occasionally wavy; texture fine, even. Pin-knots and gum pockets are common defects; lumber grades address these. Works exceptionally well — turns, carves, sands, takes finish (oil, shellac, lacquer, polyurethane all read well). Steam-bends moderately. Does not glue as forgivingly as oak; surface preparation matters. The UV-darkening property means freshly-finished cherry needs a few weeks of light exposure before final color stabilization, and shaded areas (under a centerpiece, behind a vase) will lag the rest of the surface for the first months — a known quirk.
Principled BSDF defaults derived from the sphere woodgrain finish. Reasonable seed for Blender, Substance, Keyshot, Rhino — tune per material. Or grab the whole library at once: ForMaterials library →
# finish: woodgrain albedo #a06850 metallic 0.00 roughness 0.60 ior 1.45 transmission 0.00 clearcoat 0.00 sheen 0.00 anisotropic 0.60
{
"albedo": "#a06850",
"metallic": 0.0,
"roughness": 0.6,
"ior": 1.45,
"transmission": 0.0,
"clearcoat": 0.0,
"sheen": 0.0,
"anisotropic": 0.6
}
# Blender 4.x — Principled BSDF
# American Cherry (Prunus serotina, Black Cherry) · finish: woodgrain
import bpy
mat = bpy.data.materials.new(name="mat_cherry_american")
mat.use_nodes = True
bsdf = mat.node_tree.nodes["Principled BSDF"]
bsdf.inputs["Base Color"].default_value = (0.3515, 0.1384, 0.0802, 1.0)
bsdf.inputs["Metallic"].default_value = 0.000
bsdf.inputs["Roughness"].default_value = 0.600
bsdf.inputs["IOR"].default_value = 1.450
bsdf.inputs["Transmission Weight"].default_value = 0.000
bsdf.inputs["Coat Weight"].default_value = 0.000
bsdf.inputs["Sheen Weight"].default_value = 0.000
bsdf.inputs["Anisotropic"].default_value = 0.600
# KeyShot 11+ — lux Python API, Generic material
# American Cherry (Prunus serotina, Black Cherry) · finish: woodgrain
# Run from Window → Scripting Console
import lux
mat = lux.createMaterial(name="mat_cherry_american", materialType="Generic")
mat.setProperty("diffuse", (160, 104, 80)) # 8-bit sRGB
mat.setProperty("metallic", 0.000)
mat.setProperty("roughness", 0.600)
mat.setProperty("indexOfRefraction", 1.450)
mat.setProperty("transparency", 0.000)
mat.setProperty("coatingWeight", 0.000)
{
"_format": "Substance Designer / Painter \u2014 pbrMetalRough constants",
"_about": "American Cherry (Prunus serotina, Black Cherry) \u00b7 finish: woodgrain",
"baseColor": {
"r": 0.3515,
"g": 0.1384,
"b": 0.0802
},
"metallic": 0.0,
"roughness": 0.6,
"ior": 1.45,
"opacity": 1.0,
"anisotropyLevel": 0.6,
"_notes": "Channels listed are the standard Substance pbrMetalRough output. Drop into a Uniform Color node per channel, or as the constant input on a layered stack."
}{
"asset": {
"version": "2.0",
"generator": "ForMatter"
},
"materials": [
{
"name": "mat_cherry_american",
"pbrMetallicRoughness": {
"baseColorFactor": [
0.3515,
0.1384,
0.0802,
1.0
],
"metallicFactor": 0.0,
"roughnessFactor": 0.6
},
"extensions": {
"KHR_materials_ior": {
"ior": 1.45
}
}
}
]
}# USD Preview Surface — UsdShade.MaterialLook prim attributes
# American Cherry (Prunus serotina, Black Cherry) · finish: woodgrain
def Material "mat_cherry_american" {
token outputs:surface.connect = </mat_cherry_american/PreviewSurface.outputs:surface>
def Shader "PreviewSurface" {
uniform token info:id = "UsdPreviewSurface"
color3f inputs:diffuseColor = (0.3515, 0.1384, 0.0802)
float inputs:metallic = 0.000
float inputs:roughness = 0.600
float inputs:ior = 1.450
float inputs:opacity = 1.000
float inputs:clearcoat = 0.000
token outputs:surface
}
}
Furniture-grade American hardwood. Burns easily — sharp tools and positive feeds matter more than absolute speed. Patinas to a darker red over years of UV exposure; the milled fresh surface starts pale and richens with use.
Onsrud Cutter hardwood feeds & speeds; USDA Forest Products Lab Black Cherry machining notes; The Wood Database (cherry).
→ try this material in swarfUSDA Forest Products Lab Wood Handbook, Black Cherry entry; The Wood Database.
House vocabulary — terms ForMatter uses with intent.
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Conway's Material World on raw materials, Lefteri's Making It on processes, Forty's Concrete and Culture, Sparke's Design in Context, Bürdek's Design: History, Theory and Practice of Product Design, Schröpfer's Material Design on materials in architecture, Winchester's The Perfectionists on tolerance, Minshall's Your Life Is Manufactured on the global supply chain, von Busch's Making Trouble on material activism, Were's How Materials Matter, Hegger / Drexler / Zeumer's Basics Materials, Untracht and McCreight on metalsmithing, USDA Forest Products Lab on woods, GIA on gemstones, Schott / CoorsTek / Toray / Owens Corning datasheets, MakeItFrom for verifiable property numbers, ASM Handbook, ISO standards. Museum holdings draw from the Met, MAD, V&A, Smithsonian American Art Museum, Newark Museum of Art, British Museum, Heard Museum, Smithsonian NMAI, Eiteljorg Museum, Philadelphia Museum of Art, Cranbrook Art Museum, and Grand Rapids Art Museum — collection-record permalinks only, designer overview pages and exhibition listings excluded. Voice blocks now ride on every entry kind — material, process, application, and finish — and include Ruskin on iron, Anni Albers on twining, Greg Lynn on the shred-and-teeth NURBS lineage, Pugin on the metal that won't be hammered, Barthes / Yanagi / Benjamin channeled within their philosophy; Sparke, Bürdek, Forty, Conway, Schröpfer, Minshall, von Busch, Lefteri, Pat Pruitt, Mary Lee Hu, Tom Joyce, Albert Paley, and the rest of the contemporary makers quoted verbatim with citation. All cited.
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