How Olive Wood is Harvested and Prepared for Crafting
Every handcrafted olive wood piece begins the same way — not with a tool in a workshop, but with a cut made in an ancient grove.
Understanding how olive wood gets from tree to finished object changes how you see every piece. The weight of it. The grain. The specific warmth it holds when you pick it up. These things have a history that starts years before any craftsman touches the wood — and in Tuscany, that history goes back further than almost anywhere else in the world.
The Olive Tree — Built for Longevity
Olive trees are among the longest-lived trees on earth. Trees producing fruit in Tuscany today were planted by the grandparents of people who are now grandparents themselves. Some of the oldest olive groves in the Val di Chiana contain trees that are several hundred years old — gnarled, massive, slow-growing, and still producing fruit every autumn.
This longevity shapes the wood in ways that matter to craftsmen. Olive wood grows slowly. Slow growth produces tight grain rings. Tight grain means density — a hardness and durability that most other woods cannot match. It also means the wood moves less with changes in temperature and humidity, which is why olive wood pieces last for generations without warping or cracking if properly cared for.
The age of the tree is visible in the finished piece. Wood from an older tree has more complex grain patterns, deeper color variations, and a character that younger wood simply does not have. When you hold a piece of olive wood from a centuries-old Tuscan tree, you are holding something that has been growing longer than most countries have existed in their current form.
Where the Wood Comes From — Sustainable by Tradition
Olive trees are not cut down for their wood. This is one of the most important things to understand about olive wood as a material — and one of the reasons it is genuinely sustainable rather than performatively so.
The wood used in crafting comes from three sources:
Pruning — Olive trees require regular pruning to remain productive. Branches are removed every two to three years to maintain the shape of the tree, allow light into the canopy, and encourage fruit production. These pruned branches, which would otherwise be burned or composted, are the primary source of olive wood for crafting.
Storm damage — Tuscan winters occasionally bring storms severe enough to break large branches or damage tree trunks. This wood, which would otherwise be lost, is collected and dried for crafting.
End of productive life — Very occasionally, an olive tree reaches the end of its productive life and is removed. The trunk of an old olive tree provides some of the most extraordinary wood available — massively grained, deeply colored, full of the knots and cracks that, filled with natural resin or left as they are, become the most distinctive features of a finished piece.
In all three cases, no tree is harmed for the wood. The material is a byproduct of agricultural practice that has been happening in Tuscany for millennia.
The Drying Process — Where Most of the Work Happens
Freshly cut olive wood cannot be worked immediately. It contains significant moisture — sometimes 40-50% of its weight — and if you attempt to cut or shape it before it dries, it will crack as it loses that moisture unevenly.
Proper drying is the most time-consuming part of the entire process and the step that most separates quality olive wood crafting from rushed production.
The wood is cut into rough sections and stacked in a way that allows air to circulate freely around every surface. It is dried slowly, in a covered but ventilated space, away from direct heat. Rushing this process with artificial heat causes the wood to dry too quickly on the outside while the interior remains wet — producing cracks that run deep into the material and make it unusable.
Properly air-dried olive wood takes a minimum of one year per centimeter of thickness. A board 4 centimeters thick requires at least four years of drying before it is ready to work. This is not an inconvenience — it is the reason quality olive wood pieces last for generations.
At Arpi Woodworking, we source our olive wood from trusted suppliers in Tuscany who apply exactly this standard. We do not work with kiln-dried wood that has been rushed through the process. The drying time is built into the cost of every piece — and it is worth it.
Preparing the Wood for the Workshop
Once dried, the wood goes through several preparation stages before it becomes a finished piece.
Initial cutting — The dried sections are cut into workable sizes. This is when the grain of the wood becomes fully visible for the first time and decisions are made about which pieces are suitable for which products. A particularly beautiful section of grain might become a serving board. A smaller piece with an interesting knot might become a bowl. The wood guides these decisions as much as the craftsman does.
Surfacing — The rough-cut wood is planed flat and smooth, revealing the full depth of the grain pattern and color. This is often the moment when the beauty of a particular piece becomes fully apparent.
Knot and crack treatment — Olive wood is full of knots and natural cracks. These are not defects — they are features. In our workshop, significant cracks and hollow knots are filled with natural resin or left as they are, depending on the piece. Epoxy-filled knots, tinted to complement the natural color of the wood, have become one of the signature aesthetic features of our work. No two pieces are the same.
Final drying check — Before any finishing work begins, the moisture content of the wood is checked. Any remaining moisture above acceptable levels means more drying time, regardless of how long the wood has already been stored. This step cannot be skipped.
From Prepared Wood to Finished Piece
Only after all of this — the pruning, the drying, the preparation — does the actual craft begin. The cutting, shaping, sanding, and finishing that produce a completed olive wood piece is in many ways the final stage of a process that started years earlier in a Tuscan grove.
This is why we describe our pieces the way we do. When you hold an olive wood board from our Cortona workshop, you are not holding a manufactured product. You are holding the result of centuries of agricultural tradition, years of careful drying, and hours of craft — all of it in service of an object that will last for decades if you treat it with the simple care it deserves.
Explore Our Olive Wood Collection
Every piece in the Tuscany Crafted collection has gone through exactly this process — from Tuscan grove to Cortona workshop to your home.
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📍 Via Guelfa 24-26, Cortona (AR), Tuscany, Italy 📩 arpi@arpiwoodworking.com 📞 +39 333 4638251