Why Colour your Wooden Floors?

The most common use of wood stain is to colour match boards that have been replaced. Board replacement may be required as uncovering or sanding reveals damage. Alternatively, the boards may have been replaced long ago but never matched because the floor was perhaps carpeted.

Sometimes, the colour matching is required as two rooms have been knocked into one. Previously, one room may have been carpeted and the other not - leading to a mismatch of shades.

Occasionally, a strip of carpet has been fitted as a walkway over varnished floorboards, with the boards under the carpet being a quite different shade to the boards that have been exposed to light

You may also simply wish, as a matter of personal preference, to have a darker or lighter floor; or one which is more golden, more red or more brown.

Colour Matching

One way is to find a suitable woodstain and carefully test to see if the desired match is being achieved.

Alternatively, where the colour is the same but just darker in part, a wood bleach can be applied in stages until a match is achieved

Floor Paint

Specialist floor paints can also be applied, usually with the aim of maintaining the wood texture and grain. A distressed paint finish has also been popular at times. Sometimes painting is desirable to dramatically extend the life of floorboards in poor condition - as paint can hide a multitude of sins!

if well prepared the results can be very good; however, bear in mind that if you do want to get back to a pure wood finish, a lot of sanding may be required down the line. Paint should be finished with at least 2 coats of polyurethane as paint alone will not withstand wear and tear.