Bespoke Premier Architectural Grade
- Any of our full range of 350+ highest quality architectural natural veneers manufactured to any design or arrangement, plus dyed veneers
- Core materials cut to size before lippings are applied, panels calibrated and then faces over-veneered
- Manufactured exactly to your requirements
- Can be jointed in various ways to achieve an infinite number of bespoke designs
- Available with concealed lippings and/or inlays installed
- Can be supplied as sequenced sets, where the grain pattern continues from panel to panel as a fully matched set once installed
To ensure the face quality & bonding is maintained on a project, some manufacturers, architects and designers specify these panels as 'Premier Grade (AAA)' to ensure commercial grade veneered panels are not used by subcontractors as low cost replacements, as this can often lead to poor final results and end-user complaints.
The core materials are cut to size and any lippings or veneer edging applied. The panel is then calibrated to ensure the lippings do not telegraph through the face. At this point the faces of the lipped core panels are then over-veneered, which ensures the lippings are not only bonded to the core but are also sandwiched in between the veneer faces.
Concealed lippings are more robust & reliable than retro-fitted edging. They give a much cleaner overall finish to the final installation as the edging cannot be seen from the front of the panel, and a profile can be run along the edge of the panel if required, e.g. small chamfer.
Where lippings are not a viable option, e.g. if lumber is not available similar to the face veneer, veneer edging can be applied before face veneering to achieve the same aim. Wherever possible this veneer edging will be multi-layer edging created using the same veneer stock to ensure more robustness.
Fully matched, individually identified sets of veneered panels can be supplied so the grain matched right through the full set - left-to-right and/or top-to-bottom - with or without decorative inlays pre-installed to any pattern.
Attention to detail at every point of production ensures a quality that proves difficult for others to match.
Commercial Manufacture
- Lower-priced veneers of the more commonly-requested species
- Clip & Run jointed veneers
- Produced to standard sizes such as 2440x1220mm, 3050x1220mm and cut after pressing
Commercially manufactured panels will typically allow narrower leaves on the faces and may include some natural characteristics of the wood that would not typically be allowed in Premier Grade veneered panels. Such characteristics may sometimes include: half-crowns, slight mismatch in grain pattern, increase in sugar, mineral streak or similar characteristics that do not affect the integrity of the panel.
Veneered panels produced using a commercial line are generally supplied with bookmatched crown/flat cut veneers in bookmatched form, while quarter cut veneers are ofen slipmatched to avoid the dark/light colouring that can happen with quartered veneers due to the way the 'tight' and 'loose' sides of the veneer reflect light differently
They can be cut to size after production and exposed lippings or veneer subsequently fitted. NB: While offering a lower cost, exposed lippings will be visible from the front of the panels and edging material more likely to fail over time because they are bonded to the panel edges only. For this reason, we advise against this option wherever possible & commercially viable.
Superior Grade
- Selected veneers in similar quality to Premier Grade but produced in standard commercial panel sizes for recutting as required
- Face veneer is often described by specifiers as AAA or A*
- NB: This grade is not available with the bespoke aspects of Premier Grade such as concealed lippings, sequencing, centre-matching, balance matching, etc
Commercial Joinery Grade Veneers
- A range of veneers of improved quality produced for commercial joinery customers at a competitive cost
- Most often supplied as Commercial Joinery Grade both sides A/A (with Commercial Joinery Grade A/B or A/Balancer available to special production)
Merchant Grade Veneers
- Produced in larger quantities of a limited range of veneers at a budget price suitable for general timber & builders merchants only
- Often produced using a lower-quality core material - particularly relevant when ordered as veneered plywood
- Typically classified as A/B or A/Balancer
Clip and run jointed veneer manufacture
Clip and run jointing describes an uninterrupted process of jointing for lowest cost that produces a continuous ribbon of infinite width, similar to an extrusion process.
This continuous ribbon is cut to the width required without giving consideration to where the joints lie on the resultant sheet.
Centre-matched panels and other specialist jointing methods are therefore not normally feasible in this process
Grades A/A, A/B & A/Balancer
A/A means that both sides are faced with a face quality veneer of the designated grade class
A/B denotes the reverse is a balancing veneer of the same species as the front but allows characteristics that preclude it being used as a face in its designated grade, e.g. mismatch in veneer, discolouration, and other similar non-open defects.
Merchant Grade 'Veneer two-sides' panels are most often actually graded A/B
