Bamboo Cabinetry
3 October 2008
“An Idea Whose Time Has Come”
I don’t normally write about other cabinetmakers, and I extra especially do not write about cabinetmakers in Southern California who aren’t named Joe, but every now and again, something comes along that makes a firm rule develop a bit of flexibility. And Laguna Bamboo is very much a case in point. What first piques my interest in them is their use of bamboo, as my partner uses this material whenever he can, such as in his bamboo shoe benches—and does so for the same reason that Laguna Bamboo does so. It is environmentally sound, by which we mean that the use of it does little or no damage to the environment.
Any forest, once cut, requires replenishment, and under the right circumstances, this can be arranged. A hardwood forest of oak, for example, once harvested is not forever lost. It can be re-grown. The problem, though, is that it takes many decades for this forest to re-grow, and if it is to be characterized as “old growth,” it must be left alone until the growth is old—several centuries. Bamboo, by way of distinct contrast, reaches full growth in four years! That is not a misprint, not a forty or four hundred that somehow became a four. It is four years.
The other part of the equation that makes bamboo particularly attractive is that it is both very hard and very capable of being shaped into a
product that is usable by woodworkers. When we first started this website I wrote a lengthy nine-blog dissertation on the need for bamboo plywood and its many uses, but let me just summarize that here by saying that it is now possible to get plywood sheets that are not plywood at all in the traditional sense of the word. They are made up of bamboo that has been sliced into strips and glued into sheets. These sheets are then glued together just as traditional plywood would be—each sheet positioned at 90° to the preceding sheet—and the result is actually stronger than regular plywood because bamboo is so hard. It can be
milled like wood, finished like wood, and used like wood, but it does not grow like wood. At four years of age bamboo is harvested. The mighty oak tree at that age, by way of distinct contrast, is mostly just thinking about becoming an oak one day. You might also check out my partner Joe Dusel’s discussion on bamboo plywood.
These pictures, as I indicated earlier, are from Laguna Bamboo, and those of our readers who are in the Orange County area may want to check out this company for their kitchen projects. But I cannot close this blog without urging my San Diego area readers to check out Woodistry, as my partner has also done a lot of innovative work with this product. That’s the thing with an idea whose time has come. No one ever corners the market on it!
Joseph
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