Burl with Charcoal Burl with Cherry Burl with Chocolate Burl with Green Burnt Cork Grounds Espresso Roast Golden Slate Hints of Cocoa Midnight Slate Mosaic Tiles Natural Bricks Natural Burl Natural with Sliced Cork River Mocha Sand Slate Small Pebbles
Cork & The Environment
 
The Cork Forest

Cork is the outer bark of the evergreen cork oak (Quercus suber). This variety of oak grows mainly in Portugal, Spain, southern France, Italy, and the North Africa.

Cork is sustainable. It is harvested by stripping the bark every nine years. Each cork oak tree provides an average 16 harvests over its 150-200 year lifespan.

Cork harvesting is one of the best examples of a sustainable agro-forestry system, where people use the natural resources around them without disturbing or destroying nature. Cork harvesting has been a way of life in the Mediterranean for at least a thousand years. The forests are ancient.



Harvesting cork is a highly skilled job: even the axes are specially designed. Cork cutters make precise incisions into the cork bark and then strip it off the trees — like peeling a skin away from a banana. An experienced worker can gather up to 1,300 lbs of cork each day.

After harvest, each tree is painted with a big white number to indicate when it was last stripped. The trees are left for nine years to allow the cork bark to grow back and then the whole process starts again.

After the wine corks are cut from the bark, the remaining cork is used to make flooring.