Happy Tuesday. I hope everybody had a nicer weekend than our poor friends in the Midwest who were walloped by snow. Here’s looking to brighter days ahead.

As promised, this week I’ll be talking about the wondrous characteristics of teak. So here we go—the ten things you should know about teak so you can make an educated purchase choice and be the life of any cocktail party:

1. Teak’s genus name is Tectona Grandis. And unlike many other woods (Shorea or Eucalyptus, for example), there is only one teak. If you see companies marketing “teak-like” products or furniture made from “African teak,” you can be sure you are not looking at the real thing.
2. Contrary to popular belief, teak is not a rainforest tree. Teak is a deciduous tree native to Southeast Asia (it spreads naturally from India through Myanmar and Thailand to Laos).
3. To ensure the responsible harvesting of teak, plantations have been established across the world in Asia, Africa, and South & Central America. At Arthur Lauer, we are proud to say that our teak furniture is made from this sustainably harvested teak.
4. Teak has a high natural oil content that enables it to resist cracking, rotting, splitting, termites, and other borer insects.
5. In addition to its natural oils, teak’s dense grain helps it combat harsh elements such as rain, snow, hail, heat, and humidity.
6. Teak has been used in ship building for centuries because of its durability, beauty, and unique ability to prevent rust and corrosion when in contact with metal. In fact, teak is still used today in the manufacture of yachts.
7. Teak originally made its transition into outdoor furniture when old ships were no longer seaworthy. The ships’ decks, which were still in excellent shape, were dismantled and made into teak furniture.
8. There are teak benches in parks across England that are nearly a century old.
9. After several seasons outside teak furniture will develop a graceful silver-gray patina. The patina is actually the teak’s natural oil that has risen to the surface and been oxidized by the sun’s ultra-violet rays.
10. Teak’s durability and elegant appearance, combined with its long history of use in luxury applications, give it an unparalleled prestige factor. (This may not technically be a scientific fact, but it’s true nonetheless!)

What do optical illusions, jokes, or television shows have to do with teak furniture? Not much, but we don’t need to talk about outdoor furniture every day. Every Friday I will attempt to show you something interesting that most likely has nothing to do with teak, but should be a nice way to start your weekend.

Now here’s an interesting optical illusion. For it to work, stare at the center crosshairs and move your head towards and away from the computer screen. You’ll see that the images appear to rotate. Sometimes when you just look to the side or relax your eyes a bit, you’ll notice the circles moving as well.

Until next week, where we’ll be discussing the unique properties of teak that make it the perfect material for outdoor furniture.

Spring is upon us!

Personally, I can’t get enough snow. I love the way it looks, I love the way it smells, I love the clean, crisp air it brings. Nothing puts me in a finer mood than 12 inches of snow on the ground and more falling from the clouds.

Professionally, I hate the stuff. I’m doing back flips that the warm weather of Spring is here. Since we’re in the teak furniture business, and most of our customers use our furniture outdoors, snow is our professional nemesis. It reduces the amount of furniture we sell and prevents you from cooking, dining, swimming, lounging, gardening, sleeping, and just plain living outside. So I’ll say a quick thank you to Mother Nature for this timely change of seasons, and move right into what you should be doing right about now to prepare your teak patio furniture for your seasonal migration outdoors.

You will still want to clean your teak furniture once a year simply to remove such things a sap, bird residue, pollen, and other natural remnants. Well, fortunately teak is a very low maintenance material that is easy to clean. Simply spray Olympic Deck Wash onto your teak furniture with a garden sprayer, wait five minutes, and then spray it off with a garden hose. Done. Your outdoor furniture will now take on an ivory finish that will weather back to the silver-gray patina in a few months. (For more difficult stains I suggest trying water, Murphy’s Oil Soap, and a soft bristle brush.)

If you use furniture covers, clean them off with soap and water (spraying them down with an everyday garden hose will work just fine). If you put away your covers for the next nine months without having washed them, you may get some unpleasant mildew growth when you pull them back out of the garage next winter.

It bears mentioning that while furniture covers work well in keeping outdoor residue at bay, teak furniture does not need to be protected from such elements as rain, sleet, snow, or heat & humidity. Teak is an incredibly dense-grained wood with a high oil content that helps it repel the weather without any finish or need to cover it or bring it inside for the winter. Just leave your furniture outdoors, and in about a year it will develop silvery gray patina that provides the distinguished, well-known look of finely aged teak. But the truly remarkable characteristics of teak are a subject for another day. I push on.

If you have any of our all-weather cushions or throw pillows, you have several options available to you. If they were under furniture covers then there is nothing to do except sit down. If you left them outdoors with your teak furniture (like I do) then you should give them a good cleaning to remove any dirt that has built up. To clean the fabric, first brush off loose particulate, and then clean briskly with a rag using water and a mild natural soap. Water temperature should be no more than 100° F, as acrylic fiber is sensitive to temperatures at that level. To remove stains that this washing process does not address, use a fabric spot remover. If you have any Arthur Lauer cushions or throw pillows, you can also contact our customer service department for additional recommended cleaning solutions.

However, if you don’t want to leave your cushions and pillows outdoors at all, shelter them in a dry enclosed area or use one of our teak Jefferson Storage Chests, which should keep them relatively dry throughout the seasons.

Lastly, enjoy. You’re done. That’s it. Finito. As I’ve said ad nauseum (at least that’s what my wife tells me), teak furniture is incredibly low maintenance. Especially when you consider the fact that not only is it easy to clean, but you never need to drag it indoors, and it will literally last for decades.

Thanks for tuning in, and I’ll see everyone again on Friday. Oh yes, the answer to last week’s riddle.

Riddle: A boy was born in Boston, Massachusetts to parents who were each born in Boston, Massachusetts. Neither the boy nor his parents have ever left the state, but the boy is not a U.S. citizen. How is this possible?

Answer: The boy was born in 1770 before the Declaration of Independence. Thus there was not yet a United States to be a citizen of.

What do riddles, factoids, or movie reviews have to do with teak furniture? Nothing, but that doesn’t mean we can’t have a little fun every once in awhile. On Fridays I’ll post something interesting that probably has very little to do with teak or outdoor furniture, but it should at least make you smile or think.

So for my first entertainment post I thought I’d indulge in one of my favorite pastimes . . . riddles. Ever since I was a child I was enamored with riddles. I was obsessed with solving mysteries, and I always enjoyed the twist in thinking involved. So, teak lovers, riddle me this:

A boy was born in Boston, Massachusetts to parents who were each born in Boston, Massachusetts. Neither the boy nor his parents have ever left the state, but the boy is not a U.S. citizen. How is this possible?

Now obviously you are looking at this while on the Internet, but try not to use Google to help you. That would ruin all of the fun. I’ll post the answer in next week’s entry. Enjoy!

Welcome, everyone to the Arthur Lauer blog, or as we affectionately call it around here - the teak journAL (Get it? AL.). When we originally began discussing the idea of the teak journAL, my first reaction was “Is this right for us?”. When I think of blogs, I think of teenagers with online diaries or political pundits weighing in on the latest legislation. Hardly imagery that comes to mind when I think of luxury teak furniture.

But as I spoke to more people, did some reading, and listened to more customers, I began to really see a need for reliable information on outdoor furniture in general and teak furniture in particular. I heard questions that needed answering, “facts” that needed correcting, and myths that needed busting. Also, I love talking. So I’ll take any chance I can get to express my opinions, and here in the teak journAL you’ll hear me wax poetic about such topics as how best to clean and care for your teak furniture, the differences between various types of outdoor furniture materials, and the hottest trends in the outdoor furniture industry. Plus, we have so many fantastic things going on at Arthur Lauer that I just needed a place where I could brag a little and let you all in on the excitement.

And just to mix things up a bit, every Friday I’ll post something purely for fun. Who knows, one time it may be a great joke I heard while another time it might be my take on the Oscars. The way I see it, if you can’t inform and entertain at the same time then get off the stage.

By the way, please feel free to comment on any of my entries or ask any questions weighing on your mind. I always enjoy interacting with our customers and fans, and this forum seems especially conducive to doing so. With that I’ll shut up for today, and get to my topic of cleaning your teak furniture next week.