Wood Flooring

Wood is a general material for floor tiles and parquets. Wood floors offer a number of benefits over other flooring options, including durability, beauty and affordability. There are several types of wood floors:

Solid flooring is all-wood flooring that is one piece of wood from top to bottom. This is an excellent choice in most areas of a home on the ground level or above. It also gives you opportunities for customization. Engineered flooring consists of layers of wood pressed together with grains running in different directions. This is perfect for basements, kitchens, powder rooms and utility rooms. Engineered flooring is also more dimensionally stable than solid wood. Acrylic impregnated floors are super hard, extremely durable floors because they have been injected with acrylics. This is more often used in commercial installations such as shopping malls and restaurants.

Wood floors also have different styles. Strip flooring is linear flooring that is usually 2 ¼" or 3 ¼" wide. It creates a linear effect in a room, promoting the illusion of a larger space. Plank flooring is also linear; however, it is wider in width. Parquet flooring is a series of wood flooring pieces that create a geometric design. Some of the more popular wood flooring choices are oak, maple and ash for hardwoods, and pine, birch and fir for softwoods.

Hardwood floors are more durable and resistant to damage than most softwood floors, but with proper care and maintenance, softwood floors are also bound to last a long time. There are also other wood flooring material options such as bamboo, which is more durable than most hardwoods, and specialty woods that are a bit more expensive but worth every cent you spend. Samples of these specialty woods are walnut, teak and cherry.