Welcome to Surface, a blog by Carlisle Wide Plank Floors. Join us in discussion about hardwood flooring wood grains & styles, home decor, green building products, trends and more.
Lars Von Löwen has posted some kind words about us on his blog
If you are contemplating using wood for your next flooring project and don’t want to settle for anything just ordinary. You know, something that will have your guests stumbling into each other at your next dinner party because they’re so infatuated with it, kind of floor.”
Be sure to check out both his blog and his main site vonlowendesigns
About Von Löwen Designs
Award winning designer and Certified Green Building Professional Lars Von Lowen
has designed and directed hundreds of kitchen, bath and other living spaces
within his career. Von Lowen Designs can be found in the cities of Boston,
Manhattan, Los Angeles, Newport Beach and Lake Tahoe, in addition
to both residential and multi-unit projects throughout the entire
San Francisco Bay Area.
Posted on Aug 10, 2009 AT 01:19 AM in (0) Comments
Karen and Percy Byers of Falling Waters, West Virginia took a long time to decide what floors to install in the kitchen of their split-level house, starting with a flooring shop in their area. “We were looking for something older looking and something made (and grown) in the U.S., “ Karen writes. The flooring store showed them the most popular “distressed-look” floor, but Karen says she found them all too “manufactured” looking.
“Nothing looked ‘real’ and we didn’t see anything that appealed to us,” she said.
So, the Byers shopped around to three or four more stores, finally returning to the first store where a salesperson showed her samples of a Carlisle floor. Karen liked what she saw and went home and looked up Carlisle on the Internet.
The next challenge was deciding on the type of floor. Karen wanted something light- to medium-colored, while her husband wanted dark wood. They had medium oak cabinets in the kitchen and a recently added porch had blocked the sun coming in, so Karen was worried about something that was too dark. Oak was out because they wanted a contrast to their cabinets.
“My husband liked the grain in Oak and I liked the swirly patterns that come in Cherry. We almost settled on Pine, but neither of us were 100 percent okay with that decision,” Karen writes.
Working with Lauren Fanti at Carlisle, who sent the Byers many samples, the couple finally “fell in love” with the Walnut. “It was dark, yes, but it had a lot of lighter colors running through it. It had the grain he wanted and the swirling I liked,” Karen said.
Still, Karen got her husband to agree that if, in the end, the floor made the kitchen look too dark, they would paint the cupboards.
All that thought and planning paid off! Karen says it was very hard for her to judge how a more dark floor would look from a sample and trying to imagine it where her current white floor was. “We are so happy with our decision! And the distressing! We didn’t expect it to be as beautiful as it is!” Karen wrote. “We love how some boards are more golden than the dark; how there are tiny holes that go clean through; how there are cross marks on some of the boards (like the grain naturally goes the length of the board and then you see it going across). It’s beautiful!!!”
Neighbors have come to inspect the work and approved, Karen says. “When my father came over, the first thing he said was how it looks like an old-time floor that you’d see in a 100-year-old house. That sort of hit the nail on the head—that’s what we wanted to achieve.”
Posted on Aug 09, 2009 AT 11:39 PM in (0) Comments
Here’s a do-it-yourself job made all the better in Salt Lake City, Utah. A woman moved from Boston and her dad, a contractor, did the do-it-yourself remodeling of her kitchen and floors. He used 8-inch country grade Heart Pine, graded for fewer knots, in the main areas. It was finished in Tung Oil and water base. For the kitchen, he used 8-inch Hit or Miss Eastern White Pine in gingerbread that was also finished in Tung Oil and water base in the kitchen.
The Carlisle sample shop and mill here in Stoddard received kudos for meeting the knot specifications 100 percent. In addition, this order was Rocky Mountain Kiln dried and has hardly moved.
The pictures below show dad’s work was well worth the effort.
Posted on Aug 08, 2009 AT 12:05 AM in (0) Comments
Maria Diez is a Carlisle customer from Brownsville, Texas, and she was kind enough to send us these photos of the floors she installed last year—during hurricane season. The installation was interrupted, twice, for evacuations! Maria wasn’t too sure about the floor’s “character” when it arrived—when you choose and mill each board by hand, they have a lot of what looks like imperfections. But, as always, the staining process really won her over and now she loves her Country Hickory floors—all 3,000 square feet of them! .They are stained with Gingerbread and finished in tung oil. The floor is in 4- to 8-inch widths and is installed over concrete.
Posted on Aug 05, 2009 AT 05:24 AM in (0) Comments
Birch is one of our lesser-requested woods for floors, but we wanted to show you these spectacular photos from a customer of ours who is quite happy he chose it. The floor is pre-finished with a Gingerbread stain and is done in our premium Birch, with widths from 4 to 8 inches.
Posted on Aug 03, 2009 AT 05:17 AM in (0) Comments
Customer Stories. Green building. Design tips. DIY. Our blog features lots of articles that help peel back the layers of complexity regarding your flooring choices. Subscribe to our blog.
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