Surface Blog

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.

Pre-finished and engineered Carlisle floors are excellent choices in commercial, retail projects

Posted by Christine Halvorson

…one floor, one board at a time. That’s how we make all of our floors. It’s also been a Carlisle motto from the beginning, meant to convey our process and our intense focus on customization and customer support. This focus extends to the many commercial and residential projects we get involved in as we attempt—and usually succeed—in meeting the demands of design and designers, of brand, of tight budgets and tight schedules, and of the high standards under which you do business.

Your project may call for an unheard of board width, a precise hue or a first-ever mix of wood types. Our design consultants are experts in wood species, wood grading and the almost infinite possibilities of various stains and finishes. They can recreate any look your project demands.

© Callison/Chris Eden 2009

Prefinished and engineered floors are relatively new to Carlisle, but they’ve already been discovered and relished by designers and project managers—with good reason. They’re easy to install, and they’re durable and adaptable. Carlisle’s prefinished options can be ordered with a Custom, Commercial Grade coat for heavy traffic areas, for example.

Engineered floors are easy to swap out when it’s time for a whole brand makeover or one tweak to one location. They’re our most popular choice for installing over concrete. And whenever we work on a commercial project, our design consultants make a free, on-site visit for consultation. Carlisle’s team of designers carry the same discerning eye and professional experience as your design team, which means a mutually agreed upon vision is easily realized.

Posted on October 16, 2009 at 03:49 PM in Hardwood Flooring • (0) Comments
Beautiful Carlisle floors in a house for a beautiful boat

Posted by Christine Halvorson

We should all be so lucky as the boat housed in this boat house. What a place to be! Check out the photo album below to see what a Michigan family did with Carlisle’s premium wide plank flooring in Longleaf Heart Pine, 6-inch and 8-inch widths, prefinished with Amber.

The floor is a perfect shimmering complement to the wooden boat housed below. Many of our customers come to use with concerns about moisture and wood floors. No worries here! Our durable wood flooring can be applied beyond a house on terra ferma to a boat house over water.

Posted on September 29, 2009 at 08:58 AM in Hardwood Flooring • (0) Comments
Carlisle floors make bold statement in Steamboat Springs “dream home”

Posted by Christine Halvorson

Jason Wolfe, an associate in our Los Angeles Design Center, got these great photos from Priya Garcia, a designer he recently worked with in creating the floors for a new vacation “dream home” for a family in Steamboat Springs, Colorado. Garcia had visited the Design Center and “fell in love” with Carlisle’s floors and so, when the opportunity came up with this project, she knew Carlisle floors would be the perfect match.

Three rooms in the vacation home were all finished the same way, with our antique Eastern White Pine, distressed with Carlisle’s custom Hit-or-Miss treatment and done in 8- to 12-inch widths. All were then finished with our Gingerbread Stain and Tung oil. The primary wall in the living room (below) is finished with Carlisle’s 400-year-old reclaimed brown barn siding.
Jason says this is the type of project he really loves to work on because he can see the vision of the client transformed into reality, step by step. “For this one, we had players on both sides of the Rocky Mountains involved!”

Posted on September 28, 2009 at 08:59 AM in Hardwood Flooring • (0) Comments
Premium Heart Pine wide plank floors in living room leads to possible Country Pine next

Posted by Christine Halvorson

Gregg and Marsha Martin in North Carolina installed a Carlisle floor in their living room back in 2006 and now they’re back considering another floor for their house. They were kind enough to send us this photo of the Premium Grade Heart Pine they had put in their living room then. It was finished with Autumn Leaf and Tung Oil. Now they are back for more, considering the installation of a pre-finished floor.

Posted on September 17, 2009 at 09:22 PM in Customer Stories • Hardwood Flooring • (0) Comments
One happy Carlisle customer helps out another

Posted by Christine Halvorson

Our customers sometimes rely on each other for advice on their flooring, as evidenced by an exchange among two Texans and personnel here at Carlisle. We love it when customers agree to be “references” for us. It’s sort of like we’re applying for a job—which we are, kind of!

So, Rodney Stephenson of Hempstead was thinking about a rustic wide plank floor that would have to be glued directly to a concrete slab. He also had questions about the softness of the pine.

With the help of Carlisle, he got advice from customer Jonnie Steffek in Richmond, who had installed her floor not that long ago. She told Rodney about an installation of Eastern White Pine.

Said Jonnie: “I went with the unfinished wood rather than pre-finished. My reason for that is, I like floors to show wear/pathways/knot holes.”

Carlisle supplied information to the client about gluing to the slab and the softness issue.

Jonnie wrote: “As far as being ‘soft’, that may be; however, in my book, ‘dings’ add character. I had a friend long ago, that would buy an antique, then refinish it to the point that it looked like it came direct from a furniture store…We have a few antiques scattered throughout the house, but they are old, and they look old.”

Jonnie invited Rodney over to her neck of the woods to see her floors for himself. We are indebted!

Posted on August 27, 2009 at 08:23 PM in Customer Stories • Hardwood Flooring • (0) Comments