Home » The Carlisle Story
In the 1960’s, the founder of our company, Dale Carlisle was building homes reminiscent of those he remembered from his childhood in New Hampshire-the old center-chimney colonials, saltboxes and traditional capes that still grace New England today. He found one common theme within our country’s early homes: every one had wide plank floors. Dale wanted these floors for the homes he built, and restored. He wanted to recreate the authentic wide plank floors of our heritage. That was the beginning of the Carlisle family business.
Visit Dale's Gunning Decoys site
Browse some
of our Historic Projects
Carlisle’s first floor, circa 1966
RES-TO-RA-TION- The act of restoring. To bring back into existence or use. To bring back to (in original or a former, more desirable condition).
For 40 years, the restoration has been at the heart of our business; in fact, when Dale Carlisle began crafting our first Old Growth Eastern White Pine wide plank floors, much of the demand was from Historic Restoration Projects.
Because most of the homes built in our country in the 1600-1700s used these magnificent wide pine boards on the floors, when historic restoration projects wanted a historically accurate floor they turned to Dale to recreate these floors- such as in the Jethro Coffin House on Nantucket- the oldest home in America.
The original name of our Company was appropriately Carlisle Restoration Lumber which spoke not to the restored wood itself, but rather to the “Restoration” of the spirit and tradition of the original wide plank floor. Several years ago, we made the decision to change our name to Carlisle Wide Plank Floors in order to better represent the true nature of what we make- traditional, custom crafted solid wood flooring in a variety of Old Growth Pines, Hardwoods and reclaimed Antique woods.
