| Home
Improvement Guide
A
New Floor
Floors
take lots of wear and tear – we traipse across them
in muddy shoes and spill our drinks on them, while our kids
and pets do unmentionable things to them. That said, if a
floor doesn’t look good, you won’t want it in
your home. It also needs to be affordable – both to
buy and lay.
Cost is
a prime consideration – however lovely or practical
a floor is, it shouldn’t blow your budget. Fortunately,
most flooring for the main rooms in your home – living
room, bedroom and hallway (kitchens and bathrooms obviously
require moisture-resistant surfaces) – comes in a wide
range of prices. It’s tempting to want the best money
can buy, but if this is your first home and you expect to
outgrow it, consider a cheaper option that will still look
good to potential buyers but not necessarily in 20 years’
time. Also bear in mind preparation – costs leap up
if the subfloor requires a great deal of work.
Next
consider how much wear and tear the floor's going to take.
Obviously
hallways experience most traffic (stairs and landings too
if you only have an upstairs loo). Bedrooms probably experience
the least and living rooms somewhere in between.
The look
you want is, of course, entirely up to you, bearing in mind
the style of your home, the other rooms in it and your tastes.
It’s possible to get a nice-looking floor on any budget
– here’s a rundown of the main contenders.
Real
wood
Nothing beats the beauty of real wood – it’s hardwearing,
easy to clean and lasts for years, but can be an expensive.
Prices start at around £20 per square metre, rising
to much more. At Solid Floor for example, they range from
around £60 to £160 per square (you can pay as
much £1,000 for the same amount for luxury floors).
Woodlinefloors has a calculator to help you work out how much
you’ll need.
Only very
competent DIYers should attempt to lay a real wood floor because,
unlike many laminates, the planks need to be glued together
and secured with clamps, which isn’t easy. Expect to
pay around £20-£30 per square metre for professional
installation and find out whether that includes underlay,
edging and other materials.
Laminate
If you want wood without the expense, laminate is the obvious
answer. Most laminates have a built-in ‘wear layer’,
which protects them against most scratches, scuffs, stains
and impacts – ideal if you’ve got kids or pets.
Laminates are also designed to be fade and water-resistant
(when properly installed and sealed) and don’t need
waxing or polishing.
Many laminates
simply click together, making them easy to fit and take up
again if need be. Most people could lay a laminate floor in
a weekend (though it’s hard on the knees and best as
a two-person job) so it’s a quick, cost-effective and
contemporary option. Getting it laid
professionally adds around £10-20 per square metre.
The flooring itself ranges from less than £10 to more
than £30 per square metre, though the cheaper ones can
be harder and more time consuming to lay because they’re
not so well made.
To lay
laminate, you’ll need to buy edging which starts at
around £3 a length and underlay, starting at around
£10 a roll. Installation kits cost from around £8.50.
See Aspen Flooring or Pergo for fitting instructions (the
latter also has a calculator).
Carpet
Though not as popular as it once was, carpet wins in the comfort
stakes. It’s great for absorbing sound (a bare, smooth
floor can produce seven to 12 times more noise than a carpeted
one) and is a safe, non-slip surface for children. It’s
also heat retentive – 15 per cent of all household heat
disappears through uninsulated floors – and traps airborne
dust, unlike hard surfaces. A carpet’s pile, fibres
and how it’s made affect how it’ll feel and wear
– The Carpet Foundation and Storey Carpets for more.
The best
quality carpets are hessian-backed. Foam-backed carpets are
cheaper and don’t need underlay, while felt-backed ones
are relatively new – they feel nice, provide good heat
and sound insulation and can be laid with or without underlay.
A carpet costing less than £10 per square metre is unlikely
to look good after a couple of years – expect to pay
at least double that for a long-lasting, hardwearing one.
Good underlay (prices start at around £5.50 per square
metre) is equally important, as it makes the carpet more comfortable,
prolongs its life by up to 40 per cent and improves sound
insulation.
The Carpet
Foundation recommends always using a professional fitter (costing
upwards of £3 per square metre) who should also measure
up for you, but you can do it yourself if you know what you’re
doing.
Storey Carpets has a great information centre, including fitting
instructions. Also see the BBC homes website for its carpet
calculator.
Natural
floor coverings
These can be a cheaper alternative to carpet, depending on
the material. Coir is the cheapest and very hardwearing, at
around £10 per square metre, while sisal, also hardwearing,
starts at around £23 (an average price for a traditional
wool-mix carpet). Jute starts at around £16 –
it’s softer, less hardwearing and most suitable for
bedrooms. Expect to pay around another £3 per square
metre for underlay and £5 for fitting. You should use
a fitter with experience of natural floor coverings because
they’re installed differently to carpets, or see Kersaint
Cobb for DIY instructions.
PVC
If you dare to be daring, Harvey Maria have just the thing.
Their innovative designs include corks, pebbles, flowers,
sand and grass and are suitable for any room in the house.
And they’re made of hardwearing PVC. If nothing else,
you can’t accuse them of being boring!
Rubber
Alternatively, how about a spot of industrial chic? Dalsouple
produces rubber floors in 70 different colours and 32 textures,
either plain or patterned. They can also create colours just
for you, for example, to match a Dulux paint. Rubber’s
extremely tough so it expels spills and surface burns but
is still warm and soft underfoot. The flooring costs around
£40 per square metre and professional installation is
recommended, adding around another £10-£20 per
square metre.
Whatever
you go for, remember that the floor’s important –
it’s your room’s fifth wall – so don’t
skimp on what you want and with so much choice around, you
shouldn’t have to.
Flooring
tips
- Remember
to include flooring when deciding on your décor –
this makes planning and budgeting easier.
- Laying
the same flooring throughout the main rooms provides continuity
and makes the space seem more seamless.
- Laminate/wood
should be laid so the light falls along the length of it.
- Many
floors have to acclimatise to the room’s temperature
and humidity before they’re laid.
- Busy
or colourful floorcoverings won’t have the universal
appeal of neutral ones when you sell, or stand the test
of time so well.
- Patterned
floors make rooms appear smaller, but hide the dirt better.
- Protect
high-traffic areas with rugs and mats, alternating them
occasionally.
- Leave
laying the flooring till last, then you won’t ruin
it when you’re decorating.
Contacts
|
