In 1992, I designed the rocking chair that anchors this business. We saw ourselves as a Texas company and made the chairs from wood of the state tree of Texas, pecan — selected for heartwood. As the internet made our market the world, we began to build the chairs of other woods. About the same time, our reliable source for heart pecan ceased that operation. We couldn’t find what we needed elsewhere. We dropped pecan rockers as a catalogued item.
Pecan is difficult to work and to match into pleasing compositions of figure and color. The wood is difficult to dry. The trees are mostly sapwood. The sapwood is white and boring unless creatively used in contrast with heartwood. The heartwood varies in color dramatically from tree to tree.
Brandon Berdoll, https://berdollsawmill.com does an impeccable job of drying pecan.
As we near the twenty-fifth anniversary of the Weeks Rocker, it is fitting that we offer pecan rockers as special editions. We bought enough lumber from Brandon for 8 or 9 rockers.
Austin began marking the lumber September 16 — marking the wood so individual chairs will have wood from the same tree. Each chair will be predominately heartwood with some contrasting sapwood and will have coherent color and figure. They will be ready to ship November 2. They will cost $2750.
