Design is very subjective, isn’t it? I mean, you only have to work with a few clients before you realise that what you thought was glaringly beautiful, isn’t to the satisfaction of the customer.

Of course, your initial nigh perfect design, tends to spiral downwards from there, in accordance with client instructions.

Personally, I have a preference for quality minimalism, skilful colour palettes, or designs using natural textures. Among the latter, are those designs, which use wooden textures to invoke different emotions to the visitor.

It’s not easy to pull off the ‘wooden’ look. In fact, it can look tacky very quickly, particularly if a tiled image is in use. However, some designers have manged to create some high-impact websites, using wooden textures.

Here are some of the best I know of. Please feel free to point to one’s I’ve missed, by leaving a comment.

1. The Things We Make – Nice work. It possibly helped land him a job at Carsonified recently.

2. Armen Thomassian – Not sure who this rare boy is, but this is his Garden Fence

3. Writing Web Words – Clean, crisp, nice.

4. Lucy Blackmore – This is design gives the impression that someone creative is behind it. It’s therefore no surprise to discover that Lucy is an artist.

5. Nebon Media – Excellent use of perspective. Take a few minutes to look around this little studio tree house.

6. Wire and Twine – A more subtle use of wood, but clean and effective.

7. Red Blu – If all Flash sites were as creative as this, I might be encouraged to actually learn it!

8. Viget Advance – One of my favourite overall designs here.

9. Ed Did It – I’m not sure what Ed did, but I’d say he’s happy to say he created this design.

10. Lesly G – One of the best wooden backgrounds I found. Nice.

11. We Eatt – I told my wife about this site today. But, to be honest, I wasn’t pointing out the background!

12. Candes Projects – Nice work by Cristian, good use of transparency.

13. Ecstatic Media – Background works well with the pastel colours.

14. Designed by Anderson – I don’t normally like the lighter wooden backgrounds, but this is very clean, and well executed.

15. David Hellmann – This design has been up for a while now. Got to love it though.

16. Avenue Creative – No messing about with this portfolio.

17. Carsonified – How many times have you seen this design? It never grows old!

18. Nando Designer – Good work.

19. Henry Jones – Another one which has been around for a while, but I love it.

20. Happily Create – A little too orange for my liking, but I love the grain in this wood background.