We all want to do our part to help save our planet. Nevertheless, most of us do not like to be told what we should purchase or what we should not consider purchasing. We have been encouraged to wean ourselves away from incandescent light bulbs, and switch to energy-saving bulbs, which we have now grown accustomed to, and in many cases have come to prefer, but what about flooring? Fortunately, flooring is also an area where you can go green, and do so in style. It is indeed possible to have great looking wood flooring in your home without contributing to worldwide deforestation.
Wood Flooring and Sustainable Wood Flooring
Your choices are many. Going green don’t have to mean going without wood floors to keep trees from being harvested. The secret lies in sustainability. When a forest is growing as fast as its timber is being harvested, it can be considered to be a sustainable resource. If your beautiful living room wood flooring has been manufactured from material coming from a sustainable resource, there is no need to experience a guilt trip every time you look at it.
Bamboo is an good example of a sustainable source of wood for flooring. Bamboo is sustainable to the point of being invasive. When bamboo is harvested as a wood product, the roots are left in the ground as the trees are cut. New trees quickly start to grow from these roots, and in a few short years this new growth is itself ready to be harvested.
White ash is also a sustainable species, but for a different reason, the reason being intelligent forestry management. White ash can be rather heavily harvested because the harvested trees are constantly being replaced and there are restrictions on the number of trees that can be harvested are. Some varieties of maple are considered sustainable for yet another reason, that being their sheer abundance.
Purchasing cork flooring is yet another way to save our planet and its forests, or at least save the southern European forests the cork oak is found in. The cork oak tree itself is the responsible party in this case, as the flooring material comes from bark that is shed from the tree. There is no need to cut a single tree down. The flooring material lies scattered around its base. Cork is also extensively used as core material for engineered-wood-flooring.
Other Types of Sustainable Flooring
Engineered wood is another good example of sustainable flooring material, since it only a small percentage of it is solid wood. The rest is scrap or recycled material. The same is true to a greater extent with laminates. Although supplies are somewhat limited, recycled wood such as antique wood is an option. Old barn wood was once a very popular choice and still is, but old barns are unfortunately not sustainable, and are becoming scarcer with each passing year.
There many examples of non-wood sustainable flooring, including stone, ceramic, vinyl, rubber, and of course, carpeting. Many if not most homeowners like to have at least some wood flooring in their homes however. Fortunately, the choices of sustainable wood flooring are many and varied. Have no fear of going green. There are more attractive options available to you than you might think.
Wood flooring has often been one of the best choices for rooms that you want to add a special look and feel to. There are so many wonderful thoughts that circle your head when you imagine a warm fire and the look of new wood flooring in den or family room. This article will look at some of the main reason why you shod add wood flooring to your list.
Wood Flooring Definitely Has Some Unique Advantages
One of the most advantages to adding wood flooring to your home is the added value it will give. There is something about wood flooring which adds a real charm to the look and feel of a room. Many assume that wood flooring cost too much, but the value gained may offset this argument.
There Is Always a Bad Side to Wood Flooring
Wood flooring has a tendency to show fading in certain areas. If the room is exposed to extreme amounts of light you will need to keep your wood flooring protect sop it does not fade. If you install wood flooring in a kitchen you need to be aware that it can get dings and dents form dropping dishes or cans in the kitchen when cooking.
There Are Great New Technologies in Wood Flooring Today
The most noticeable improvements in wood flooring over the past 30 years or so would be in the types of stains that have been created to care for and protect your wood flooring material. Because these stains and polishes can make you flooring so nice they make it very easy to care for. Usually a broom and wet cloth are all that is needed to make it nice looking again.
Wood flooring may need to be touched up or resurfaced in time. This is a huge advantage over many other types of wood flooring surfaces. Once the wood begins to fade or showing damage and wear you could have it completely redone. The new flooring will look just as good as a new wood flooring and you ca do it for much less than installing a whole new wood flooring surface.
Real wood flooring have desired choice for many families and home decorators over the years because it presents a warm appealing & refined appearance any property that laminate floors & vinyl can’t match. Nonetheless, wooden flooring is currently getting to be much more popular because of the reason that engineered-wood-flooring has created the choice both more efficient and a lot less costly so that it is a good choice for every home. In many cases, it’s eco-friendly with a number of finishes and colors available, engineered-wood-flooring is among the top purchases that anybody may make for their property.
On top of that, since engineered-wood-floors are generally only about 38 to 58 of an inching thick, that can be fitted on top of existing-floor-surfaces to make installation truly effortless activity. Therefore, instead being worried about finishing sanding & tearing out the current floor before an area is ready for use, engineered-wood-flooring may fitted in only a day.
When it’s the time to actually lay engineered-wood-flooring into a home there’s a choice between-lengthier panel install which in ‘floating’ in style, or simply choose straight forward tongue & groove pieces, which makes it more realistic to contemplate laying the flooring without the need of any professional assistance. As a final point, there’s a demand to take a close look at the veneer of the flooring that is being considered because the density of the layers will denote how eye-catching the end product comes out to be.