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.

Carlisle’s Quarter Sawn White Oak: It’s A Grain Thing.

Posted by Christine Halvorson

White Oak is a very unique wood because its grain lends itself to a variety of different looks, depending on how it is sawn.

Normally, a log is plain sawn, i.e. it is first cut into a rough square by taking off four sections of the outer bark and sapwood, and then sawn with a series of parallel cuts — as if a loaf of bread were cut lengthwise to yield long slices. Grain-wise, this typically gives a floor a little bit of everything: straight lines as well as a variety of swirls and “cathedral patterns” — several swirls inside one another. This is the way most floors are cut.

Quarter sawn cuts generally only apply to Oak and a few other hardwoods. They are made by first cutting the log into four pie-shaped wedges and then making a series of cuts which are more or less perpendicular to the tree rings, which produces straighter grain. Without getting too technical, let’s just say that quarter sawn White Oak produces more “rays” or “flecks,” which is the hallmark look of Mission furniture/cabinetry. In addition to being visually interesting, this grain pattern produces extremely stable boards.

Various stains can then be used to further enhance the grain or make it more subtle.

This Long Island, New York residence features a beautiful mixture of quarter sawn, rift sawn and plain sawn White Oak. Note the contrast between the various grain patterns.

Posted on October 29, 2009 at 03:23 PM in Hardwood Flooring • (0) Comments
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