Hardwood Floors Come In Many Styles

Hardwood is one of the most popular flooring choices. Not only is it beautiful, but it also adds warmth to a room. The mellow glow of a wood finish and the sound of the wood as you pad across it make any room seem homey and cozy.

Once people were limited to only a few woods for flooring, but today there is such variety that you can match the architectural style and the decor of any home.

Hardwood floors do have a bad rap for being expensive and hard to maintain, but this is untrue. Hardwood is less expensive than stone and true linoleum and sometimes even less than some high-end vinyls. Maintenance is easy -- just sweep and occasionally mop with a water- based floor cleaner, and you're set. -- Choices: As the word ``hardwood'' implies, only the hardest woods are usually used for flooring. White and red (actually, slightly pink) oak are most commonly installed because they are widely available and extremely hard. However, you are not limited to these.

Other choices include maple, hard pine, ash and cherry. More uncommon woods such as madrone and eucalyptus also make great flooring. Recycled woods (remilled after being removed from a structure) have become popular lately.

Even a soft wood such as fir is sometimes used. In fact, fir was once used mostly as a subfloor. It moved to the top when homeowners discovered it under layers of linoleum and chose to refinish the floor and incorporate its rustic look into their decor.

How to choose the wood for your house? Start with what you like and can afford, then consider what's appropriate for the style of your house. Open-grained woods such as ash are more casual; closed-grained woods such as cherry feel more formal. Pine and fir have a rustic quality.

Finishes are also important. Dark finishes often work well in more traditional interiors; lighter ones can be more contemporary -- but it comes down to what you like personally. If you prefer darker woods, stick to oak, cherry and walnut, which take a dark stain well. For lighter finishes, choose white oak, ash and maple. These woods look best when clear finished or stained with a very light, almost translucent stain.

Oak can be stained light or dark, as can cherry. Maple looks best clear finished but can be dye stained in a bright color for contemporary houses. Pine looks great when finished to look old, rather than new.

Choose the finish you like, then choose the best wood for that finish. That way you're not trying to make oak look like cherry or maple look like pine. -- Detailing: Wood floors are available in strips, planks and squares (for parquet). You can even create patterns such as herringbone, but the wood must be precut. Before ordering the wood, you must have a pattern drawn so you can not only see it but also make subtle adjustments for odd spaces or a slightly out-of- square room.

Add detail with feature strips or accent borders, usually one or two inches wide. These often run about six inches from the baseboards or cabinet kicks, but can be closer or farther, depending on the design. They're usually made of walnut, but can be any contrasting wood.
Most hardwood flooring contractors also have access to premade borders and accents that have floral designs and more complicated border strips such as ones that look like braids. They are not cheap; a 12- inch square for the corners of the room could run as much as $100 and up, depending on the pattern. And you'll need more than one.

But you can get a great look for considerably less money using feature strips. Feature strips can be simple -- just a inch-wide strip around the perimeter, for example. Or they can be complicated: Several types of wood strips such as walnut and cherry can be combined and made to interlock at corners. Or they can be inlaid to create a braid pattern.

You can also combine wood with another material such as natural stone by insetting that material into the wood between wide planks. Create a trellis pattern with the wood first, then install the stone or tile.

Remember, however, that wood expands and contracts; stone and tile do not. If the installment of stone and wood is too tight, the floor may buckle in that area. That's why hardwood flooring installations are best left to a pro. -- Appropriate rooms: Wood floors are great throughout the house except for bathrooms and laundry rooms where moisture -- primarily from overflows -- can damage the wood. Wood floors can usually handle steam but not puddles. If you really want wood in your bathroom, consider teak, which is naturally water repellent.

Wood floors are among the most versatile surface materials in terms of design. With a highly polished finish, they can be elegant; with a rustic finish, they can be casual. But with any finish, the natural wood grain adds warmth to a room.

In kitchens, wood floors provide a comfortable surface for standing. In bedrooms, they're cozy when topped with a soft area rug. In family rooms, they just get better with wear. And in living rooms, they form a subtle backdrop for furniture and art. -- Advantages: Wood floors are easy to maintain and are durable, and the same material can be run throughout almost the entire house. There are numerous contractors in the Bay Area who install wood flooring, which is not the case for more specialized flooring, such as glass or terrazzo. -- Disadvantages: In most rooms, you may need a rug over the hardwood floor to reduce noise and add comfort. This will add to your flooring budget. In some areas, bright sun can dry and damage a wood floor. Water is a wood floor's worst enemy, so if a pipe bursts or a tub overflows and floods a room with a hardwood floor, the floor or the damaged parts will probably have to be replaced. -- Installation: There are several factors to consider when installing a hardwood floor. First, the material should be delivered to the site several days before installation so it will be the same temperature as the space where it will be installed. Wood expands and contracts. It must get used to the new environment first; otherwise it will do its expanding and contracting after installation and start popping up.

Make sure the subfloor or existing floor is even. If any part is uneven (which commonly happens when floor joists shift), the hardwood will pop up over that raised area. If so, sand or nail down the problem spot.

Decide which direction the floor strips or planks will run. For example, the boards should run the length of a hall -- not side to side. Your contractor can help you with this.

Will the wood flooring butt up to another type of flooring? If so, how will you handle the transition? Usually a reducer or transition strip made of the same wood as the wood flooring connects different flooring materials. If one flooring material is higher, however, you'll need to have a custom transition made.

Unlike other floors such as stone or vinyl, hardwood floors are nailed to the subfloor with high-pressure nail guns. Strips, planks and squares of hardwood are fit together with tongue-and-groove sides that must be tight in order to keep them from shifting. Pieces of the hardwood will need to be cut to fit around doorway transitions, stairs or a fireplace surround. This is done on site as needed.

After installation, allow the floors to acclimate to the new environment for several days. Apply the color coat, stain or dye, and top with three to four coats of polyurethane. This is the protective layer between the wood and the outside world that helps prevent dents, wear and scratches.

You might assume that the more coats of polyurethane you apply to a floor, the stronger and more durable it will be. But sandwiching coat after coat can actually make the floor finish weaker. The top coat must bond to the wood so they work together as one.

If you get a dent in the wood as well as the surface, then the finish is performing well. If the dent only affects the top coat, the finish may crack and lift in that area. This leaves an area of floor vulnerable to moisture, and the finish may start to lift more and spread. You'll then need to sand and recoat the area, but the finish sheen will be different in that spot. It's better to get the finish right the first time.
Most hardwood floors are available unfinished and are finished on site after installation. However, prefinished floors are also available in a wide variety of woods and factory finishes. That means no sanding, no toxic fumes and no drying time on your end.

But prefinished floors have drawbacks. If a plank or strip is damaged during installation, it will need to be repaired and touched up with stain and a top coat. Also, you are limited to the company's selection of floor finishes. If you like a finish but want it a little lighter, you're out of luck. With unfinished hardwood, however, you can make a color adjustment on a sample prior to finishing. -- Cost: Red and white oak are usually the least expensive, with prices starting at about $10 to $15 per square foot installed and finished. Prices start at $30 for woods such as cherry, ash, pine and fir. Details such as feature strips, patterns, special border treatments and finishes can push the tab even higher. -- Durability: Softer woods such as pine and fir will wear well but may show more dings and dents than harder woods such as oak. But with the proper care, your hardwood floors can last a lifetime. After years of wear, they can be refinished to look almost as good as new.

You will usually see wear in traffic areas and around the sink where water may have dripped onto the floor. Water and sun are a wood floor's worst enemies. Sun can fade and dry out wood near exterior windows and doors. Cherry is especially prone to sun damage because it is very light sensitive. Most polyurethane coatings, however, include a UV inhibitor, a sunscreen to protect your floor from the sun's harsh rays.

If water is allowed to sit on a floor (usually the area around a sink or under a refrigerator), it will begin to break down the finish and warp the wood. So check these areas periodically to prevent small problems from becoming large ones.