Antique French Oak

French vintners coined the term terroir to describe the earthy mix of climate, soil, and weather conditions that make wine taste the way it does. There’s no equivalent word to describe lumber, but the concept of terroir applies: every piece of wood on earth originally came from a tree, and that tree grew on a unique patch of soil in its particular corner of the world. The wind, weather, soil and sun make it what it is. That’s why this collection of Antique French Oak is so special, and couldn’t be replicated in any other place.

Sourced last autumn, this wood was salvaged from floorboards in farmhouses east of Paris in the French towns of Metz, Nancy, Dijon, as well as Lorraine and Bougogne in the region of Est. Dating from the 17th and 18th centuries, thesehouses were sturdily built and well loved. You wouldn’t find the kind of high-polish case furniture favored by the various Louis here; instead you’d be enchanted by the rustic simplicity and unspoiled beauty of the architecture and the surrounding countryside. Picture charmingly idiosyncratic paint colors, pictures and lighting fixtures just slightly askew, clean and fresh-smelling tea towels, and the promise of fresh bread each morning. So much history and daily life unfolded in these houses, and some pieces of it are coming to America.

Crafting The Whitney Floors | Part 2

Writing for The New York Times on April 19, Michael Kimmelman described the new Whitney Museum of American Art this way:

'There’s a generosity to the architecture, a sense of art connecting with the city and vice versa...

Inside, irregularly weathered pine floors recycled from old factories temper a language of concrete and steel. Those same industrial materials break up the mass of the building on the outside, by turns refracting and absorbing sunlight, nudging upward, gently, the scale of a swiftly growing neighborhood.'

The story behind these 'irregularly weathered pine floors recycled from old factories' is, in fact, a rather remarkable one - the journey of rough, antique, and landfill-bound timbers carefully re-imagined and re-engineered as the flooring for New York City's newest architectural landmark.

Custom Milling The Whitney Floors

After reclaiming the raw timber materials from inactive American factories (Phillip Morris, Maidenform, Paul G. Mehlin & Sons Piano Company), The Hudson Company embarked on the fully-integrated, custom milling process, in collaboration with Cooper Robertson and The Renzo Piano Building Workshop, the museum's lead architects. 

The final Whitney installation exceeds 65,000 square feet of Reclaimed Heart Pine [Chalk Finish] flooring throughout all of the galleries and administrative offices.  In order to deliver the final product, The Hudson Company custom milled over 270,000 board feet of reclaimed timbers. These sizeable timbers ranged in size from 4” x 17” x 22’ to 11” x 17” x 24’, some weighing in excess of 1,200 pounds.

Once the raw material arrived at our Pine Plains, NY facility, metal detectors were used to locate old fasteners (nails, bolts, screws) embedded within the timbers, and then all unwanted debris is removed by hand.

Next, utilizing our 75 HP fully hydraulic 6” double edge blade saw mill, we milled the timbers into manageable dimensions (1.75" x 10" x 8-20').  Because the Whitney floor was uniquely designed to be 1.5” x 8,” we oversized the the flooring planks to 1.75” x 10" and then kiln dried each plank to 165 degrees Fahrenheit eliminating any remaining insect life and setting the pitch for stability and proper finishing.

From here, the Whitney floors went through the remaining steps of The Hudson Company's hands-on, custom milling process: the planks were re-graded, planed, ripped, molded, and checked for defects and unwanted irregularities before delivery.

Click for more information about The Hudson Company, our team, and for galleries of our reclaimed and custom-milled flooring installation projects.

Click to watch The Hudson Company sourcing and milling video.

Inside The Hudson Company's Pine Plains, NY Mill.

Milling reclaimed material, Pine Plains, NY.

De-nailing the reclaimed industrial timbers at the Pine Plains, NY Mill.

Milling reclaimed material, Pine Plains, NY.

Reclaimed Heart Pine [Chalk Finish] planks on site at the new Whitney Museum, ready for Install.

Crafting The Whitney Floors | Part 1

In last week’s New York Magazine, journalist Jerry Saltz reviewed the new Whitney Museum of American Art, designed by Renzo Piano Building Workshop and Cooper Robertson Architects and praised The Hudson Company’s Reclaimed Heart Pine [Chalk Finish] floors as “perfect.”  

But long before the finished floors were ready for the feet of thousands of artists, art-lovers, and visitors to the new museum, they were the antique timbers of abandoned industrial buildings, destined for the landfill - until they were reclaimed by The Hudson Company.

In order to meet the design specifications of the architects, The Hudson Company custom-milled over 270,000 board feet (the equivalent of 27 tractor trailer loads) of reclaimed, antique Heart Pine sourced from the Phillip Morris factory in Louisville, KY, the Paul G. Mehlin & Sons Piano Company in New York, and the Maidenform Brands Factory in Bayonne, NJ.

In the photos below you can see the Heart Pine timbers as they pass through the steps of being demolished, reclaimed, denailed, kiln dryed, and milled at The Hudson Company mill in Pine Plains, NY. 

Click here to learn more about The Hudson Company's Reclamation Process.

Click here to see photos of the finished Reclaimed Heart Pine [Chalk Finish] floor at the new Whitney Museum of American Art.

Demolition of Phillip Morris Factory, Louisville, KY.

Demolition of Phillip Morris Factory, Louisville, KY.

Raw Material, at The Hudson Company Mill, Pine Plains, NY.

De-nailed raw material, ready for milling at The Hudson Company Mill, Pine Plains, NY.

Timbers ready for the kiln-drying process, Pine Plains, NY.

Kiln-dryed timbers, ready to be custom milled for The Whitney Museum of American Art.