Throughout most of the history of wooden furniture some attempts have been made to disguise the true nature of the wood used. Most attempts are efforts to make a lesser wood appear to be a more expensive, more beautiful or more exotic species. It may be that the desired wood is too expensive for the maker to use or it might be that it is just not available at any price - or it could be that the maker just thought he could do it cheaper and get away with it. Some of the cosmetic charades have been quite artful and ingenious while some have been heavy handed, clumsy and obvious.

  In the 18th and 19th centuries some furniture made of lesser quality wood was just painted to conceal the actual construction. But another school of makers used graining as a method of disguising the true material. In the late 18th century the graining of cabinets was in full swing. Many of these examples are works of art such as the chest on chest made by the Dunlap family of cabinetmakers in New Hampshire that sold at auction in North Carolina in 2005 for $276,000. The cabinet looked like real wood even to the trained eye. A more common application was the use of black ink over a reddish background to simulate the look of rosewood. This became especially popular in the mid 19th century when rosewood Empire pieces were at a premium. Walnut Victorian chairs were often given a red wash and grained with black to look like the much more expensive rosewood. Even crotch cut mahogany was widely synthesized since it has such an erratic pattern and almost any graining technique will work. Many mid century crotch mahogany cupboards are actually painted pine or poplar. Most of this kind of work was done by individual cabinetmakers or artists. Cont'd