Marquetry (also spelled as marqueterie) is the art and craft of applying pieces of veneer to a structure to form decorative patterns, designs or pictures. The technique may be applied to case furniture or even seat furniture, to decorative small objects with smooth, veneerable surfaces or to freestanding pictorial panels appreciated in their own right. Parquetry is very similar in technique to marquetry: in the latter the pieces of veneer are of simple repeating geometric shapes, forming tiling patterns such as would cover a floor (parquet), or forming basketweave or brickwork patterns, trelliswork and the like.

Marquetry (and parquetry too) differs from the more ancient craft of inlay, in which a solid body of one material is cut out to receive sections of another to form the surface pattern. The word derives from a Middle French word meaning "inlaid work".

The veneers used are primarily woods, but may include bone, ivory, turtle-shell (conventionally called "tortoiseshell"), mother-of-pearl, pewter, brass or fine metals. Marquetry using colored straw was a specialty of some European spa resorts from the end of the 18th century. Many exotic woods as well as common European varieties can be employed, from the near-white of boxwood to the near-black of ebony, with veneers that retain stains well, like sycamore, dyed to provide colors not found in nature.

Silas Kopf is a furniture maker specializing in the art of marquetry. Born in 1949, Kopf graduated from Princeton University in 1972 with a degree in architecture and soon began designing and making furniture. In 1988, he received a Craftsman's Fellowship from the National Endowment for the Arts, and used the opportunity to study traditional marquetry technique at the École Boulle, an institute of interior architecture and design, in Paris. His major projects include several pianos commissioned by Steinway & Sons and benches, desks, and cabinets for private collections and museums. His designs frequently incorporate floral depictions, other images from nature, and trompe l'oeil concepts. He first became interested in marquetry because he hoped for an alternative, less consumerist lifestyle.

Since 1978, he has worked in Easthampton, Massachusetts, where he continues to build and design. He has an assistant, Tom Coughlin, who also designs and builds guitars.