Olive wood is a hard wood and tightly grained. This means it won’t swell up when exposed to liquid, and won’t ‘fuzz’ after being washed or soaked in soapy dish water. Olive wood is fairly dense, and has a relatively high moisture content (perhaps from its own natural resin?). You still need to oil olive wood from time to time to keep it from drying out.
The best olive wood utensils are made by Berard in France. I have a few Berard spoons and spatulas. They have thick handles and are beautifully made and finished to a high smoothness.
Bamboo is another good choice for wooden utensils. It is even harder than olive wood, but not as dense, and not as naturally moist, so you need to oil it more often compared to olive wood.
In my experience, all other types of wood are inferior to olive wood and bamboo for wooden utensils.
I have not seen or used an olive wood cutting board. I would imagine they would be very expensive.
