Thinking of building a new home or remodeling? Wanting to find flooring products for your project? The choices are endless and flooring happens to be a product many people decide to go green with. Cork and Bamboo flooring is a great option in the renewable group.
Nowadays, with ever-increasing concerns over protecting the environment and preserving natural resources, cork is once again back in the spotlight. The main reason for this is because cork is a “green” product. In other words, it’s environmentally friendly. Cork flooring is made from the renewable bark of the cork oak tree. Its supply is virtually endless. In fact, there are trees still reproducing bark that are estimated to be two hundred years old.
Cork is water proof, soft to walking on and a very unique look, but may not be as durable as a good hardwood.
Bamboo is another great choice if you want to go green. Bamboo is an alternative to traditional hardwood flooring that is:
- uniquely attractive
- strong and resilient
- dimensionally stable
- moisture and stain resistant
- environmentally-friendly
It is also less expensive than many hardwoods and can be purchased for nailed down, stapled down, glued down, or floated installation. Bamboo is becoming more popular everyday and for good reason, Bamboo is one of the most renewable products available.
But one product that is often missed in the green hardwood flooring category is reclaimed wood. Many reclaimed wood company’s supply hardwood flooring. This is because a lot of the reclaimed woods are oak and oak makes for a very hard and beautiful floor. Oak is used in old whiskey or pickling vats that are being taking down and made into hardwood flooring.
If you are into the old wood flooring look then reclaimed wood is defiantly a good direction to go. You can get reclaimed wood flooring in a newly planned look or the old skip planned look.
The hardwood flooring choices are endless and this makes the decisions very difficult. First decide the look you want to achieve, then the cost you can afford and this gets it narrowed down very quickly. Another big factor is whether you plan on installing or if you plan to hire a professional. There are a lot of snap together flooring options that make the install much simpler but the durability may not be the best. You can also find laminated products similar to plywood with a veneer on the top. These products are usually cheaper than solid wood bit will not hold up to much moisture, like the kitchen or bathrooms. You can also find a wood looking Formica top products that are very easy to install and not very expensive, but does not match the look of real wood.
The key to finding the right flooring product is finding the product that fits the look you desire and the budget you have set.
