Scraplog

Guest Post: Wood Floors

I know that this post will not be nearly as exciting as seeing a finished room but sometimes the ingredients to making a great room can be a little bit boring! Today I’m going to touch on an area that appeared in both of the rooms I showed you and yet I didn’t mention it. The floors.

Some of you asked me about them so I thought I would let you in on our new, favorite product.

You probably noticed in my before pictures that the rooms came with wall to wall carpeting. We knew when we bought the house that there were wood floors underneath the upstairs carpeting (bedrooms and hallway) so, of course we took it up! The floors weren’t in terrible shape but they weren’t in the condition that we could leave them alone. We hadn’t expected them to be. For one thing, I knew I wasn’t going to like the color of them. They are red oak and I’m not a fan red oak, especially with the finishes on them that turn them redder or golden. I wasn’t disappointed – they were gold and I hated that!
I knew that I either wanted them really, really dark (like black) or really, really light (like no finish at all). Kellie and Warren voted light and so the hunt began. We called in a floor refinisher and it wasn’t hard to figure out that he didn’t like the idea of either. Both would cost extra and his suggestion for the light floor was basically a pickling white which is not what I had in mind.

At one point I was talking about it with Kellie and Warren and in frustration pointed to a spot on the floor where a closet had been removed and the bare, unfinished floor was left. I said “there! That’s what I want.” Kellie remembered reading an article in Lonny Magazine about jcrew’s stores having unfinished floors and she said she had loved them.

That didn’t make sense to Warren or I. Having an unfinished floor would attract dirt and leave water spots and…. there is no way it would remain nice looking with NO finish on it.

So I Googled and found the article. What the article didn’t say is that they used a product that made them look unfinished even though they were well protected by it.

I researched the product, WOCA oils, and found it was sold right here out of Atlanta. I read about it several different places and had Warren read about it. It looked like something that we could do ourselves.

We did have the floors professionally sanded and then we got busy. (Warren did most of the work!)

There are product web sights that go into detail about how to apply this product and the supplies that are needed. We had two sets of stairs, one being extra tricky, that made it a little more difficult but still do-able. We did need to rent a floor buffer.

I had a scare for a couple of days when the floor looked “golden oak” in color. For those two days I felt sick! All that time and money! But once the product had absorbed into the floor it ended up being exactly what I had wanted. Relief!

The cost was more than if Warren and I had applied regular finish ourselves but less than the bid to have the regular finish professionally applied. I really don’t feel that this particular product needs a professional if you (or your spouse) have any do it yourself talent at all. It does help if there are two people so one can be on stand by for any help that is needed.

We have had children of all ages playing with their toys on them, infants crawling, juices and water spills, and furniture being dragged across them and as far as I know “not a mark”!

Here are some shots of the floor now (sorry, no before pictures!):

I’m in love.