About this stabilized Masur Birch handle block:
- Resin stabilized block with dimensions 30*48*152mm
- All colours that you see are natural
- Perfect for carving traditional size hidden tang knife handles, pipe bowls or luxurious chess pieces.
- The Curly birch block is well covered with rich characteristic birch burl pattern.
- We stabilise only the best patterned blocks, so it is considered as premium quality wood.
- Our wood is felled properly at the wintertime, dried in kiln and then manually sawn. Our purpose was to bring out the best of the Birch burl pattern including flame- and curly figures.
- Curly birch blanks are impregnated with Turntex stabilising resin throughout in a professional grade.
Curly birch has a lot of names. Mainly known as Karelian birch. The name “Karelian Birch” comes from the small geographical area between Finland and Russia. here this exotic patterned dense and very heavy wood was most abundantly found in nature.
Other names are describing quite well the curly birch exotically patterned wood: Masur birch, Birch burl, burl wood, Birch burr etc. Curly birch wood appearance is very similar to burl wood or Birdseye maple, though of a different origin.
Curly birch wood is the perfect material for carving. It will work well by hand or machine. Highly recommended material if you are making puukko- or Sami knives. Masur Birch handle block is often used for carving pens or sustainable wooden jewelry combined with carbon steel or silver.
Masur birch wood has been highly valued among Scandinavian craftsmen for centuries because it is a very beautiful, benign wood and it works well.
We stabilise our wood with non-toxic and non-flammable cactus juice. During impregnating it with resin and after heating the wood polymerises and hardens. Purpose of stabilisation is to make birch burl wood even 3x harder than oak wood. Stabilisation brings out wood natural beauty and most important: this process makes Curly birch wood resistant to humidity. The wood looks almost luminous after processing (sanding) it well!
Please notice that is a natural material. Each Curly birch blank has its unique appearance. Resin stabilized masur birch wood blank can (but not necessarily) contain invisible small, easily repairable inner cracks.
Additional information about Curly birch:
Curly birch grainy pattern wood belongs to the world’s ten most expensive among the precious wood. Despite of its appearance, Curly birch is not considered as endangered species because the curly birch is a genetical variation (mutation) of a silver birch which gives the tree its unique pattern. Therefore, the cultivation of curly birch is environmentally friendly, because this valued wood originates mainly from former agricultural areas.
Our plantation curly birch trees are certified clones of most famous Finnish curly birch tree called “Visa Kuningatar“ The seller of this wood, Rita Rubin, is the member of Programme for the Endorsement of Forest Certification, which is dedicated to promoting sustainable forest management. Seller PEFC certification number is TT-PEFC-FM006. You can find PEFC certified forest owners here: https://pefc.org/find-certified
