Our floors have been the BIGGEST pain the rear end.
Back story: the previous owners of our house installed pre-finished hickory flooring in the formal dining and living room about three years ago. We actually love the color and grain of the flooring. And with it being hickory, it’s a nicer wood than your traditional oak. Our goal was to keep that floor and match it for the rest of the level because we’re tearing out the carpet and ceramic tile. Seemed fairly easy. So I started reaching out to and meeting with various flooring companies and contractors about the floor.
Spoiler: the flooring had been discontinued. We tried several places and we just aren’t able to get it. Whomp whomp. We were SO disappointed. It was back to the drawing board that left us with two options:
• Option A: Keep the existing floor and try and find a match as close as possible for the rest of the area.
• Option B: Rip everything out, including the existing hickory floor and replace it all with something different. Most likely oak.
Both options would have essentially cost the same, so the price comparison didn’t exactly matter. We got several quotes and have had a *very* hard time finding anything remotely close. It looked like we were going to have to go with Option B. We did find an oak floor that was almost spot on for coloring to match the existing floor. It would allow us to keep the hickory down and have everything else oak. Only the grain would be different. However, we still didn’t love that option.
I ended up popping into a showroom that one of the contractors had recommended to see what pre-finished hardwood options they had. They had a ton of options and I ended up taking home three samples. Yet, none of them worked. By this point we had taken home several samples from three different showrooms. I sent the manager of the showroom a photo with the three samples laying on our current floor and he brought up yet another color to come take a look out.
It was like the heavens had parted because we found flooring! It’s not the same brand as our current floors, but it is a pre-finished hickory hardwood that is *so* close to matching. It’s hard to get the full effect in the photo, but in person it’s pretty spot on.
Because we’re leaving our current floors, we’re having to install a header board in two areas for the transition, which we are completely fine with. This isn’t the type of floor or install job that would allow us to feather in the new, and we knew that from the very beginning. At this point we’re just happy to have found something! The pre-finished doesn’t require us moving out of our house for a couple days and we’re essentially able to walk on the floor the same day it gets installed. And with it being solid hardwood (vs engineered) it’s abled to be sanded down and re-stained if we were to ever want change the color. We have an official install date for the end of the month. Will update once floors are installed!
—m.