Grass Roots
Ukao’s material of choice is bamboo, a proud member of the grass family. There are over 1,500 species of bamboo worldwide, yet only the Moso species (Phyllostachys pubescens) is currently used for our furniture pieces. Moso bamboo grows up to fifty feet in height and six inches in diameter, with a culm, or wall, thickness of an inch or more. Unlike traditional hardwoods, bamboo typically grows to maturity in 3-7 years and is renewably harvested over and over from the same mother root system for decades.

Grass Geography
The material origins of Ukao’s pieces are found across the Pacific Ocean, from some 15 million acres of Moso bamboo forests in eastern China- an area also known as the Bamboo Sea. Harvesting is performed by local farmers who, on average, will clear only about 20% of the timbers in a given acre every year.

Panda Grass?
As Gaia would have it, Giant Pandas do not eat the Moso species of bamboo. Not only do they forage at much higher elevations, but the Moso keeps its leaves and branches well above the reaching paws of a hungry black & white bear.

Grass Construction
Ukao uses bamboo that has gone through an extensive process of cutting, pest control, glueing, and planing. Bamboo ply sheets have a hardness characteristic similar to that of Red Oak.

Individual strips of bamboo are eventually laminated into two types of sheets:

		Horizontal, or Flat Grain Randomly spaced nodes can been seen on the surface
		Vertical, or Side Grain Very little of the nodes are seen due to the thin edge slices

 

Urea Formaldehyde (UF) adhesive is used to bind the flattened strips of bamboo together. This adhesive typically off-gasses up to 6 times less formaldehyde than allowed under the stringent European (E1) standards (stricter than the U.S. standards).

Grass Colors
Both the Horizontal and Vertical styles are available in two stock colors: Natural and Amber. The amber color is achieved by pressure steaming the bamboo, which darkens it by carbonization. It also results in a slightly tougher material.

Horizontal Natural		Vertical Natural
Horizontal Amber		Vertical Amber

 

Grass Finishes

Ukao can apply custom finishes to your pieces, ranging from shellacs to hand-rubbed oils. However, most of our furniture is finished with a water-borne satin lacquer finish. For a more hand-applied result, we utilize an engineered finish made from plant oils and waxes that does not contain any biocides or preservatives. Though not intended for outdoor use, it is resistant to liquids such as wine, cola, coffee, tea, fruit juice and beer.