From the Floors Up

Modern Flooring Trends

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Are you now in the process of building your dream home? Are you thinking of giving your house a whole new look but do not know where to start? Well, here’s an idea. Did you know that changing your floors can do wonders for home? If you are contemplating on giving it a modern feel through your floors, read on and find out what’s trending on modern floors.

Hardwood:  It’s a very great choice for modern floors. There is a wide variety of plank sizes and colors to choose from. However, the trend today leans toward wider planks with darker and elegant colors. Although the traditional hardwoods like teak, walnut, mahogany, cherry, birch and oak are still popular options. You can also go for the distressed and hand scraped ones. Surprisingly, even exotic choices are great. If you want to go with the green revolution, you can opt for those salvaged hardwoods.

Carpet: It actually never goes out of style. They give a luxurious and comforting feeling to any room. However, unlike hardwood floors, you need to choose more neutral and earth tone colors for your carpet. Many modern homes use hardwood flooring in all rooms except the bedrooms or den where carpet feels wonderful underfoot.

Mixing Light and Dark Woods

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With wood floors being so popular in homes these days there is a new discussion about matching or mixing wood tones between flooring and furniture. Having all the same type of wood furniture in a room is an older way of approaching design. Very formal rooms, such as dining rooms, often had all mahogany or cherry furniture. Today’s design style is more apt to mix one or more woods in a room’s design, including the flooring.

 

If you have light floors like maple or dark floors like ebony stained hickory, you are not held to only have light or dark furniture to match the floors.  Placing dark wood furniture on light floors and vice versa can make the wood of both pop. Using similar wood, dark on dark or light on light, will cause your furniture to blend in more with the flooring. This can be remedied by using a colorful or patterned area rug to break up the unified wood tones.

 

The contrast between light and dark has a more modern and contemporary feel than the traditional style of using similar wood tones. Using different wood tones can give your space more visual interest while also creating a more eclectic style that is favored by many designers today.

 

When mixing woods, pay attention to the undertones of the color just as you would when mixing paint colors or fabric colors.  Cherries and mahoganies have red undertones while maple has a more yellow undertone. These undertones will be more noticeable when you mix your woods.

Decorating with Blonde Woods

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As with any other trend, wood floors and cabinetry go in and out of color trends. For a number of years dark cabinets and floors have been the favorite tones and types of wood for the home. Painted cabinetry comes in and out of style and trend as well.  Lighter wood tones on floors and cabinets are due for a return to popularity. It is just a matter of time now that the pendulum has swung over to the dark tones before it will return to the light.

 

Birch, ash, beech and maple are all naturally pale woods. These woods are favorites of Scandinavian design which favors lighter wood tones and colors.  Other woods like pine and oak can come in lighter shades or be stained with a white wash to make them as pale as possible. Light woods with tons of grey can recalled sun and salt water bleached driftwood, making them perfect for coastal style.

 

This picture illustrates how blonde woods can be used together to create an interesting and stylish design. The heavily figured wood on the chair backs adds pattern to the overall neutral space. Blond woods on table tops, the banquette, shelves and the room divider help unify the seating around. Pairing blond woods with pale neutrals creates an open and airy design.  Accents in darker wood tones or color can easily be added to such a neutral design. A few touches of black on the chair legs and table bases ground the overall pale palette.

Light Colored Floors

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A big design trend of the past few years has been deep, dark stained wood floors. Ebony floors can be found in homes that range from traditional to contemporary and everything in between.  On the opposite end of the spectrum from these super dark floors are ultra-light wood floors.  Pale woods like beech and ash as well as floors that have been lime stained or painted white are showing up on blogs and in design magazines.  Lime stained floors have a white, almost light gray look to the wood that recalls Scandinavian style and works well with both traditional and contemporary styles.

These light floors work well with contemporary and modern spaces in homes, apartments and lofts. This living room features very pale wood floors that perfectly suit the all white furniture scheme. The textured area rug helps break up the smooth surface of the floor.  Texture is important in monochrome or neutral spaces that don’t rely on colors for interest.  Sisal or jute would also bring texture to the floor without adding too much pattern or additional color.  Having just a pop of color in a throw on the sofa doesn’t take away from the white floors or furniture.

Lighter floors can be a bonus because they don’t show as much dirt as dark wood floors.  This is good if you have a pet or kids who track in dirt from outside.  With any flooring choice, wall colors and other features in the room should be taken into consideration to make the best choice.

Let Your Small Kitchen Sparkle

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When a small kitchen sits to one side of an open living space, the general tendency is to hide it with neutrals. This kitchen breaks that rule and the design decision works.

Red cabinets grab and hold the eye when you first look at this kitchen, but there’s more happening than red. White, silver and green with touches of yellow also help this kitchen to stand out.

The extensive use of white keeps the red cabinets from overwhelming the space. White and silver are the only other tones that play permanent roles in the space, and silver is the unifying element. If you count, there are nine stainless features in this kitchen, scattered throughout, particularly around the boundaries.

Ebony wood flooring always works well with a contemporary environment. Its rich dark tones support the other color choices while grounding the room. This choice will also work well in the rest of the living space due to its versatility and automatic style.

The plant styles and positions are cleverly planned to add another color and also as a connecting feature. At first glance, the vases of greens above the sink appear to be an image or perhaps a tile backsplash. In reality, they are real plants set in an opening over the sink. The consistency of size, material and spacing turn houseplants into art. You can do the same thing if you use the same vases or pots and space them evenly.

Altogether, this kitchen invites you to cook, despite its small space. What can you do to your own kitchen – of any size – to add to its warmth and charm?

 

 

From the Floors Up

From the Floors Up blog was created with the goal of providing a destination for consumers, designers and those interested in the flooring, design, and kitchen and bath industries. Here you’ll find, current, accurate and informative information that is always just a click away!

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