Which wood is best for a timber kitchen, ash or oak?

So if you want a strong, prominent, consistent grain, it's always gonna be ash. If you want something quite subtle, but you still want the timber, then it's probably an oak would probably be the best one. Maple's gonna be quite smooth. But nine times out of 10, if you go to ask for a timber kitchen in any of the showrooms, it's generally always gonna be ash.

One, because it is more consistent. Two, because it's more sustainable. And three, because ash grows quicker. So it's naturally the correct product to be using. So you can see how the lines come through. The grain down here is you'd have areas of grain, almost not something like that. Whereas ash, it's more all the way.

So if you have an oak kitchen, some doors can almost be completely smooth with a few sort of pits in there. And then you'll get some with bigger knots. And I think that's the trouble with buyers versus suppliers is that expectation that you're trying to fill. So if someone wants an oak door and they want it to be knotty, but they might want it to be consistently knotty, and that's obviously not something that you can produce with an actual product.

So it means that you're having to literally select doors from batches to try and make it consistent. Whereas ash, it's a very reliable product.