Reclaimed Wide Plank Hardwood Flooring, The Eco Friendly Choice
Using wide plank flooring from reclaimed hardwood that’s been remilled from joists, beams or timber removed from old barns homes or buildings is a luxurious and eco friendly addition to any new home or renovation.
Hardwood flooring is amongst the healthier choices for home flooring. Fewer harsh chemicals are used to clean them than say something like linoleum or carpeting. They don’t trap dust or nasty fumes in the fibers and there is no grout to harbor things like mold and mildew.
Today more and more responsible people are making the healthy and environmentally conscious choice to move up to hardwood floors, especially if you or any of your loved ones have allergies. You actually may even be surprised to find some doctors may even recommend you make the switch to hardwood flooring and rip out that old carpeting. This is where living green and being eco-friendly comes into play. The remilled, reclaimed lumber from these older buildings is far easier to maintain and keep clean than your carpeting or tile.
Antique hardwood flooring can be reclaimed from the joists and timbers salvaged from the dismantling of old barns, buildings even houses. Hardwood floors prized not only for their rare beauty, but the character grains, stability and rich patinas they show. The fact these floors come from antique hardwoods means they will have a character all their own from years of being part of a rustic log cabin, building or even a barn. Character brought to life again by remilling and a fresh finish.
Antique hardwood can come in many types of woods, salvaged oak, maple, cherry, hickory, walnut, chestnut, white oak and other vintage reclaimed woods. One of the most unusual is the pine. Many would think judging from today’s standards pine is a softwood, yet these old pine planks come from long leaf pine trees that were many decades if not centuries old. They have a tight, unusual grain and character and are as hard as maple or oak flooring. There are no two floors exactly alike so each one is truly a one of a kind. Coming in random widths and lengths this can also add additional character to any flooring installation.
With this flooring you find a rusticness from the natural character inherent in woods harvested from centuries old, old growth trees. Trees that themselves were hundreds of years in the making. Look for knots, distinct and decidedly unusual color variations, surface checking and a large variety of varying and unusual grain patterns. Reclaimed or Antique hardwood flooring will usually have it’s origins in the old growth forests from our early American history. Today you can still find some of these floors in old homes and historic structures throughout the country
These hardwoods display a character unmatched by any artificial flooring products you’ll find today. Wide Plank hardwood flooring can also come from newly sawn old growth lumber. though much harder to find and hardly eco friendly. Why not use what we have and help to preserve our natural forest beauty. The use of old remilled hardwoods in flooring is becoming an increasingly popular choice due to a growing consumer interest in historic preservation along with the advancement of the green building and design industry. Though some of these hardwoods, such as black walnut or American chestnut are very expansive they are also a rare find. The only place you can find them is when they have been reclaimed. An eco friendly choice, offering superior quality, character and beauty, from wood that grew slowly in old growth forests. Using reclaimed hardwood is not only a great design choice but one that will keep our forest here for future generations to enjoy.
For more information on how you can add this eco friendly choice to your next project, click here to contact Pat Hicks for your no obligation consultation.
Pat is the owner of NewLifeHardwoods in Dallas Texas and is a supplier of high quality reclaimed hardwood flooring to designers and home owners throughout the United States.
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Building a house and want an eco-friendly wood floor- wide plank. Curious about your product…any info, prices, samples? Thanks!
Wide plank hardwood floors provide a beautiful and naturalistic look to your house. It is eco friendly as well. Thanks a tonne for sharing such important information.