hardwood

Plural: hardwoods

Noun

• The dense, durable wood from deciduous trees.
• the wood of broad-leaved dicotyledonous trees (as distinguished from the wood of conifers)
• The wood from any dicotyledonous tree, without regard to its hardness.
• (in more general use) As the preceding, but limited to those that are commercial timbers, and are at least average in hardness.
• The tree or tree species that yields the preceding.
• A joint term for the commercial timbers, without distinguishing which.
• The sport of basketball, in particular, an indoor basketball court; so named because the floor of an indoor basketball court is normally made of hardwood.

Adj

• Made of interlocking hardwood boards.

Examples

• Ash, hickory and oak are some of the most prominent domestic hardwoods.
• Balsa is a hardwood, but a soft hardwood.
• The elegant Scrabble board was crafted from a beautiful piece of hardwood.
• This hardwood has been planted extensively throughout the hills here.
• You should have used hardwood for this window sill instead of this junk.

Related Words

softwood