In Florida the first floor has to be built with cinder blocks. Second story can be either cinder blocks or wood frame. Then there's all kinds of other building codes that need to be met. Cali doesn't have the same building codes since they're not really hurricane prone (just every other...
We put up reclaimed wood in our living room on the TV wall and it looked great, especially with the LED strip we had hidden away up top.
EDIT: pic related. Can't believe I don't have an actual picture of just the wall. That was like three phones ago though.