Wood, black with inlays.

Wood. Black with silver sparkle inlays.

Carbon fibre. Matching finish.

Well, I like the black and matching inlays, but this one rather works for me....

However, this new one is really cool as well....

This is not the best pic, but you can see it is chrome and very clean Sparkling Gold Pearl...or, as I like to call it, Orange Sparkle!

No metal.

I think natural wood can look good with certain finishes, like my fire-engine red RCs.

But I just bought a black chrome Slingerland and natural wood would look terrible with those. I need black wood for those, ideally with a matching inlay.

I've also seen some kits where the hoop matches the finish. It's particularly striking with broken glass and sparkle finishes.

I do hate to see beaten up hoops, especially on the front. Personal taste, but I also don't like the look of drums without front hoops or bottom rims unless they were designed that way. If I wanted to get more attack out of my 12" tom, I'd mount the bottom head with an 11" hole.

Wow some beautiful kits!

I use wood on my RK's but only have one w/the inlay and plastic with my Downbeat. I do have the wood hoops (blue sparkle inlays missing) for the Downbeat but they're a little warped so I used the plastic ones (w/inlays) which kept nice. Honestly, I've never experimented enterchanging hoops to see if the sound would differ.

Matching wood and definitely round (I believe this is the preferred config.).