Flooring Recommendations
Carpet
Comfortable. Colorful. Versatile. There are many reasons why carpet is one of the most popular types of floor covering. Learn more about this fashionable and affordable flooring choice.
There’s nothing like the soft feel of a nice carpet. Warm in winter and cool in summer, it makes any room more inviting as a place to relax with friends … a place for the kids to play … a cozy, yet stylish place to feel at home. Plus, with so many styles and colors to choose from, it’s easy to find the right carpet for every décor and every taste.
There are three basic types of carpeting — Cut Pile, Loop Pile, and Cut & Loop Pile. Pile refers to the fiber yarns which are tufted or sewn into the backing. How these yarns are cut and twisted helps determines the texture and durability of the carpet. In addition, most of the fibers are either synthetic or natural wool, which offer varying degrees of wear and stain resistance.
Carpet is also one of the easiest types of flooring to install and maintain. The easy-care features of today’s advanced stain resistant carpets allow you enjoy a beautiful floor for many years. Simply vacuum regularly, clean up spills promptly, and have your carpet professionally cleaned every 12 to 18 months.
Recommended Applications
Formal or casual, carpet can add a warm feel to any room. Of course, not every style of carpet is designed for every type application.
For formal settings, both Plush (Velvet) and Saxony carpet styles have a smooth texture with a luxurious look and feel. Saxony is more resilient than Plush, so it can be used in higher traffic areas.
For versatility in casual situations, durable carpet styles like Textured Saxony, curly textured Frieze and popular Berber wear well in playrooms, workrooms, basements and other active areas.
Hardwoods
Elegant. Traditional. Adaptable. Since colonial days, hardwood flooring has been prized for its color, grain and lasting beauty. Find out more about why this flooring choice is always in fashion.
Rich in appeal, hardwood flooring enhances virtually any decor style with its sense of natural strength and its variety of finishes. Casual or formal, modern or classic, hardwood is right at home in any home.
Generally, there are two types of hardwood flooring— solid and engineered. Whether it’s a strip or plank, solid hardwood flooring is a single piece of wood, which can easily be customized and can be re-sanded to change finishes. Engineered hardwood, on the other hand, is made of several layers laminated together with grains running different directions . While engineered hardwood looks like solid hardwood, it is actually more structurally stable and can be used anywhere, even places like basements where moisture may be an issue.
Properly installed hardwood flooring requires minimal care to maintain its good looks. Simply vacuum regularly and wipe weekly with a damp mop. With its protective surface it will not absorb spills.
Recommended Applications
While you can add an elegant appeal to most any room with the rich, traditional color and texture of hardwood flooring, there are some guidelines to follow in deciding which type of hardwood to select or whether to choose hardwood at all.
Since colonial times, solid hardwood has been a preferred choice for enhancing formal rooms and hallways with a beautiful, inviting ambiance. It’s also an excellent choice for areas where you may want to change looks at a future date, since it can be sanded and refinished to meet changing tastes.
However, solid hardwood is not recommended for installation below grade (basements) or in rooms where excess moisture is present.
Engineered hardwood is a perfect alternative virtually any place solid hardwood is used, except where you might want to change the look since engineered hardwood generally cannot be sanded and refinished.
Tile
Versatile. Beautiful. Distinctive. With its wide range of materials and colors, tile’s offers endless possibilities for creating your vision for a room. In addition to it’s variety of decorative design options, tile is very durable and easy to maintain.
There are a number of common tile materials, which each offer their own unique characteristics. Natural stone, such as granite or limestone, is naturally formed so no two pieces are exactly alike. This helps create floors that are elegant and distinctive. In either glazed or unglazed styles, ceramic tiles are a popular choice for attractive, long-lasting floors. Glass, mosaic and metal tiles provide opportunities for fresh creative expression in flooring design.
While it requires careful installation, tile is a preferred choice for high traffic areas, like entranceways, and areas where moisture is an issue.
Recommended Applications
Durable, easy to maintain, and water resistant, tile flooring offers a number of advantages for use in practically any room in your home and even outside. While the choices are nearly limitless, there are a few key things to consider.
Natural stone tiles
Granite — its high density resists bacteria and moisture, which makes it ideal for kitchens, outdoors and high traffic areas.
Marble — not as tough as granite, it’s best suited for bathrooms and lower traffic areas.
Limestone — this softer stone is decoratively versatile, but not recommended for high traffic areas.
Slate — Naturally slip resistant, it’s hard and durable which helps make a good looking, long lasting floor for any room.
Ceramic, Glass and Metal
These tiles are all versatile and can be used in a variety of rooms, although glass and metal are primarily recommended as accents.
Tile floors are heavy, so it’s critical to make sure the sub-flooring is sturdy enough to support the weight. In addition, tile floors can also be chilly (not a bad thing in warm climates) and sometimes slippery.
Vinyl
Practical. Modern. Flexible. Depending on grade, resilient vinyl flooring can fit any style and budget. Relatively inexpensive, yet durable and easy to maintain, vinyl is available in an amazing selection of colors and patterns to complement virtually any decor.
Vinyl is offered with three different types of wear surfaces —including vinyl no-wax, urethane and enhanced urethane. Once a breakthrough flooring technology, no-wax is now basically an entry-level surface which still offers some resistance to scuffs and stains, but lacks the durability and low maintenance properties of urethane. And for even tougher resistance to black heel marks, dirt and most household chemicals, enhanced urethane is the solution. In addition to choices in wear surface and grade, vinyl comes in both individual tiles and sheets.
Recommended Applications
Vinyl can be installed over most surfaces and is especially popular in kitchens and bathrooms. Most vinyl just requires routine sweeping and mopping.
Affordable, easy to maintain and available in an endless variety of patterns and colors, vinyl is a popular flooring choice. While typically not recommended for formal rooms, vinyl is an excellent flooring option for many other areas of the home.
Easy to clean and maintain, durable vinyl is right at home in high traffic areas such as kitchens, baths, playrooms, mudrooms, and entranceways. In most cases, it also has a high degree of moisture resistance to spills, which reinforces its suitability for kitchens and baths.
Generally, we would suggest an enhanced urethane wear surface due to its tougher resistance to black heel marks, dirt, and household chemicals, which all tend to accompany high traffic.
Another consideration, when comparing flooring is that vinyl is resilient flooring. This means it gives a little bit, which can be much easier on the back and legs than hard materials like tile if you are on your feet a lot, such as in the kitchen.
Laminate
Decorative. Durable. Affordable. Offering the beautiful look of real wood, tile or stone at an often substantially lower cost, easy care laminates have emerged as one of today’s hottest and most versatile flooring options.
Laminate flooring is actually a multi-layer sandwich constructed of a protective wear layer over a decorative sheet containing the pattern, which is supported by a rigid core and a bottom balancing layer to help prevent warping. The result is one tough flooring that resists fading, stains, scratches and moisture.
Simple and easy to maintain, laminates are an excellent choice for high traffic areas like hallways, kitchens and family rooms.
Recommended Applications
Laminate flooring continues to grow in popularity. In fact, there’s hardly any room in the house where it’s not a smart choice.
In formal rooms such as dining rooms and living rooms, laminate duplicates the look of more expensive natural flooring materials at a fraction of the cost, while also offering more resistance to scratches and stains.
Laminate also brings the look of hardwood to rooms where the natural material couldn’t be used due to moisture concerns. However, because laminate offers better moisture and stain resistance than many natural materials and at a lower cost, it creates exciting, new decorative possibilities.
With its exceptional durability, Laminate is also excellent for use in virtually any high traffic areas. It’s also suitable for below grade installation in basements.
Area Rugs
Fashionable. Functional. Versatile. Area rugs serve a wide variety of purposes in home décor. They can be used to tie the look of a room together much as a scarf pulls an outfit together. They can help define separate spaces within a larger room or add a touch of warmth and color to a hardwood or tile floor. They can also serve as a link between rooms. And these are just some of the possibilities.
Because they serve such a wide variety of roles, area rugs come in all shapes, colors, textures, and sizes. Be it wild or subtle, extravagant or simple, these rugs are an easy way to express your decorative flair.
While there’s no installation per se, larger area rugs usually require the movement of furniture. The amount of care needed to help maintain the beauty of these rugs will vary according to rug’s material and construction as well as the specific usage.
Recommended Applications
The first rule of choosing an area rug is that there really are no rules!
Size Guidelines
- Room size rugs should leave a border of 18” to 24” on all sides.
- Dining room rugs should measure at least 4’ longer and wider than the dining room table, so chairs will not fall off the rug when pushed back from the table.
- Hallway rugs should leave be approximately 2” to 4” narrower and 18” to 24” shorter than the hallway.
- Other area rugs will vary in size according to need.
- Try using different patterns that use some common colors in the same room for a coordinated look that is also fresh.
- Don’t get boxed in by traditional rectangular or square rugs. Consider oval and round shapes as a way to inject new life in a room.