Matching Mahogony and African Mahogony?

[Tommy Emmons]

A client wants a partners desk made from A. Mahogony. I can only find Honduran Mahogony legs that are the ball&claw type. Will there be too much difference in color and grain to have AM apron and top and HM legs? If yes, do any of you know a source for AM legs with the ball&claw shape?

[Jim Becker]

I'm suspecting that they will not match, although you may be able to work it out with careful dye work.

[John Michaels]

I think the contrast might actually look better than all one type of wood. Warning about African mahogany. I've used AM for a couple of projects recently and had problems with warping. The wood was straight when I bought it and later warped so bad I had to go buy more. The second batch was also prone to warping, but not as bad. Not sure if this is true as a whole for AM but I'm switching to sapelle next time.

[Jamie Buxton]

"African Mahogany" is not one species, but rather a half dozen or species which get marketed under that moniker. Some are closer matches to Honduran Mahogany than others. You might want to get a chunk of Hondo to compare to whatever African you have, to see how big the difference is.

[Barry Richardson]

I had a similar problem with genuine mahogany ply and Sapele solids for a breakfast nook. I stained the whole thing with a mix of Minwax Red Mahogany and Early American, about 50/50, and it blended nicely. The clients were very pleased.

[Peter Quinn]

Check with the source for the SA Mahogany legs and see if they will make them for you using blanks you send them from African mahogany that matches your stock. With African Mahogany and mahogany in general it is entirely possible that even legs of the same species from different lumber lots or trees will not match each other, which puts the pressure on you to match them at finishing time. My boss uses a guy in Vermont for legs, Matthew Burak, who has a web site at Tablelegs.com. We have sent him blanks in several species to be turned or carved from wood that matched our work, so that may be a possibility. He does great work.

IME true mahogany gets deeper red tones over time, African gets a little washed out, so I worry a bit about mixing them and what that will yield over time. I find that African mahogany tents to look poorly next to true SA Mahogany and generally avoid using it in the same project, though there are some african boards that match some SA boards quite closely. In use African is not nearly as stable as SA, and it has a lot of tension trapped in it so be careful when splitting wide boards and be prepared to sneak up on your final dimensions. I have had trouble matching African to ITSELF pulling from the same pile of lumber! I would suggest if possible getting the legs fabricated first, and buying lumber on your end to match those as closely as possible. In fact I would suggest talking the client into using SA mahogany and skipping the African altogether.

If all else fails, or even if it doesn't, I took a class with Peter Gedrys a while back, and he had a fantastic system for finishing mahogany that evened its variations in tone and color while enhancing its richness and beauty. Check the FWW web site, pretty sure he did a very good article about this exact topic in the last few years. I don't think I should probably spell out his formula being he gets paid to write about it in books and magazines, but it started with lemon yellow aniline dye and finished just beautiful!