| Term | Definition |
|---|---|
| Sake | Sake – Brewed, alcoholic beverage made from fermented rice. |
| Salt Glaze | Salt Glaze – A glaze created during high-temperature firings. Sodium, usually in the form of rock salt, in introduced into the fully heated kiln and forms a clear coating on the clay, often with an orange-peel texture. |
| Sand Casting | Sand Casting – An ancient and still widely used casting method in which moistened sand is packed against a model to make a mold – usually for metal. |
| Sandblasting | Sandblasting – A method of etching the surface of material by spraying it with compressed air and sand. |
| Sapwood | Sapwood – The pale wood near the outside perimeter of a log. |
| Scagliola | Scagliola – A material developed in the 17th century in Northern Italy to duplicate marble. It is made from colored plaster and isinglass with inset marble chips. It can be polished to give a gloss finish. |
| Scale | Scale – Is the relative size of something as related to another element of known size. |
| Schematic Design Phase | Schematic Design Phase – Involves preliminary design decisions for plans and specifications. |
| Scribe Piece | Scribe Piece – Is an oversized piece of plastic laminate or wood that can be trimmed in the field to follow any minor irregularities of the wall. |
| Seamless Flooring | Seamless Flooring – A mixture of a resinous matrix, fillers, and decorative materials applied in a liquid or vicious form that cures to a hard, seamless surface. |
| Sedimentary | Sedimentary – Rocks formed by the transformation of existing rocks by gravity, atmosphere and living organisms. |
| Sepia | Sepia – Warm, reddish-brown pigment produced from octopus or cuttlefish ink, used in watercolor and drawing ink. In photography, some toning processes produce similar color in the print. |
| Shape | Shape – Is the unique characteristic of an object or space that defines it as distinct from adjacent objects or spaces. |
| Shoe Molding | Shoe Molding – A flexible trim piece that is used in conjunction with baseboard molding. This trim is used to hide any variances in height between the base molding and flooring. |
| Silkscreen Printing | Silkscreen Printing – A printing process in which paint, ink, or dye is forced through a fine screen onto the surface beneath. Different areas of the screen are blocked off with each layer of color. |
| Sill | Sill – An igneous intrusion that is more or less horizontal but forms into a single step shape. |
| Silver Gelatin | Silver Gelatin – A photographic process that uses silver halide crystals suspended within the photographic emulsion to produce the image. The most popular type of black-and-white photograph produced today. |
| Slate | Slate – A fine-grain metamorphic rock that is easily split into thin slabs, making it ideal for flooring as well as roofing. |
| Slip Match | Slip Match – A veneer method commonly used with quartered and rift-sawn material, where successively cut pieces are joined together to form a repeating pattern. The grain does not math up at the joints. |
| Slumped Glass | Slumped Glass – Preformed flat or three-dimensional glass that is reheated and shaped in a mold. |
| Soffit | Soffit – Underside of an overhang. |
| Softwood | Softwood – A botanical grouping of trees that displays needles and cones rather than broad, flat leaves. |
| Solid wood flooring | Solid wood flooring – Flooring that is constructed from solid wood boards, rather than laminated or veneered boards. Normally three-quarters of an inch thick. |
| Sound knot | Sound knot – A knot that is solid across its face, and remains intact. |
| Spalted | Spalted – Wood that contains areas of natural decay, giving it distinctive markings. |
| Statuary Marbles | Statuary Marbles – Those marbles used for sculpture. |
| Steeling | Steeling – Mending a vent (hairline) crack by cutting grooves on the reverse side of a slab of stone and inserting strips of metal. |
| Still Life | Still Life – A depiction of a group of inanimate objects arranged for symbolic or aesthetic effect. |
| Stoneware | Stoneware – A gray, red, or buff clay body that matures (becomes nonporous) between 1900°F and 2300°F. |
| Strata | Strata – Layers or beds of sedimentary rock. |
| Stringer | Stringer – A long horizontal timber used to connect uprights in a frame, or to support a floor. |
| Structure | Structure – The overall character of a rock |
| Summer beam | Summer beam – The largest beam spanning wall to wall, supporting the smaller floor joists in seventeenth-century timber-framed homes. |