Last week Carlisle celebrated the Grand Opening of its Chicago Showroom. We had a designer stop by and meet with our National Sales Director Chris Sy. Her comment – “finally someone who makes wood floors interesting”. So in this next three part series we are going to discuss some of the most popular ways that we do this - hand-distressing techniques, patterns and custom finishes.
Today we will take a look at Hand-Distressed surfaces, a design option we have offered to our clients for well over 10 years. What started out as Hand-Scraped Edges on 20” wide pine boards to give it a more authentic look, has evolved and distressing your floor is no longer done exclusively for the purpose of aging your floor in fact some of the most modern homes today have a distressed floor.
So let’s take a moment to understand all the options understand their historical significance and conclude with some tips from the experts if you are looking for a Hand-Distressed Floor.
The distressing that started it all – literally. Back when the first homes were being built, settlers lacked the modern manufacturing equipment we have today. Naturally when boards were sawn from the original Eastern White Pine stands they were not straight. So in order to install the boards they had to be hand-scraped down the edges to make them fit. This combined with years of wear resulted in a unique distressed look. When you look down the length of a room you would notice that the boards had a sculpted look down the sides and no board was 100% smooth or straight.
Today this look is recreated using an Eased or Beveled Edge, but it is not very authentic. After all, an Eased or Beveled edge is straight all the way down. At Carlisle we have a team of experienced craftsman who use specially designed hand planers and they slowly and methodically sculpt the sides of the boards so we create intermittent marks down the edge of the boards.
Benefits ~ Give your Floor an Older Look, Highlight the Wider Planks
Carlisle Design Tip ~ Don’t use a board narrowed than 11” with this floor or it will look very “busy”.
Hit or Miss Surface
The hit or miss surface is also meant to replicate the floors of our forefathers. Back in the day sawmills were predominantly found along waterways, this is how timbers were moved from place to place. And when the big Eastern White Pine logs showed up they were sawn by these mills. Again lacking the modern manufacturing equipment of today as the boards went through the saw it would never lay perfectly flat and the circular kerf marks would still be present when the boards came out the other end. Today clients want to replicate this look because it can make a new floor look much older and many clients can create an antique floor for half the price or more of a true Antique Reclaimed floor. This look is exclusively available on our Eastern White Pine floors but read on to learn about our Watermill texture for hardwoods.
Benefits ~ Save Money, Create an Antique Looking Floor
Carlisle Design Tip: Combine this with Hand-Scraped Edges for the ultimate restoration quality Eastern White Pine floor!
Watermill
After many years of offering our Hit or Miss surface on Eastern White Pine we found that clients wanted to recreate this look on our Wide Plank Hardwood floors like Walnut, Hickory and White Oak. In order to do this we had to add a few steps. Why? Eastern White Pine is a naturally soft wood so it accepts the hit or miss marks pretty naturally with almost no work required after milling. But with hardwood floors they are naturally much harder so boards that just have the hit or miss marks are very rough and quite frankly unsuitable for a floor. So after months of research and testing we uncovered a way to give our Hardwoods the look using a combination of our hand-distressing techniques. It creates the perfect balance of character and texture.
Benefits ~ Create an authentic Pine look with a Hardwood floor
Carlisle Design Tip: Avoid light finishes, Watermill looks best with medium tones stains to accentuate the mill marks but still allow the natural wood to come through.
Brushed Surface
The term “Brushed” is slightly new in the market, most designers know it as “wire brushed” but we recently discovered that there are many disadvantages to using a “wire brush” on a wood floor. This type of texture was too rough on the boards. It would tear the grain and present problems with the look and finishing. So our team worked for months to design a revolutionary new brushing technique.
After months of research our Brushed Surface was born. Using bristle brushed specially designed for Carlisle, containing over 250 fine bristles, these tools are brushed down the length of the board and create a stunning but subtle texture that our clients just love!
Benefits ~ Use a custom texture but avoid a rustic look, accentuate the beautiful grain of a White Oak or Walnut.
Carlisle Design Tip: Consider using a light finish on White Oak or Hickory or a natural finish on darker wood like Walnut. This will help show off the beautiful brushed surface so much better.
The term “footworn” is meant to conjure up images of the original Pine floors. Floors that has been walked on for centuries and have a beautiful worn feel that can’t be recreated – until now. Much like our Brushed Surface, our Footworn Surface gives clients the luxury of designing their floor with a hand-distressed surface but avoiding a really rustic look. You see the Footworn Surface is meant to sculpt the edges of the boards, the face of the boards and then gently hand-sand every little crevice to make the distressing very subtle.
Benefits ~ Subtle Distressing for formal or rustic style floors.
Carlisle Design Tip: The Footworn surface looks best on wider boards, anything less than 6-7” will look very busy.
Other Customer Surfaces
If the surface textures noted above don’t quite create the look a customer wants, then Carlisle also offers its clients the option to create a custom surface! Since every floor is hand-made and hand-distressed to order client truly get to pick the level of distressing they want. Here’s some examples
This customer wanted didn’t just want the Hand-Scraped Edges for her home, she wanted the entire floor done that way, but the Footworn Surface was too subtle, so we used a technique called Hand-Planed Surface and Edges.
This customer wanted to create a very rustic look for their lodge in Colorado. The Footworn surface was too subtle so we created a Hand-Scraped Face and Edge for this Hickory floor.
If you are in the market for a hand-distressed floor here a few tips:
1) Find out if the scraping is done by hand or a machine. Scraping done by hand is much authentic, scraping or distressing done by machine is repetitive and will result in a noticeable pattern of distressing in your floor.
2) Get samples! We invest in photograph to give our clients a general guide as to the appearance of the surfaces we can create. But nothing beats seeing the real thing in person. So call for samples or visit our showroom.
3) Make sure you understand the finish being used on your floor and what that means to the long term preservation of the hand-distressed surface. Many finishes require sanding in order to recoat the finish, this will eventually take away the hand-distressed surface. Carlisle can provide finishes with your floor that don’t need to be sanded to recoat so your floor stays the way you want it.
In the next segment we will discuss the custom patterns available. Whether you want to do your entire house, an formal entry or an elegant great room we have some great ideas for you!
Contributed by
Shanon Sterrett
Carlisle Wide Plank Floors
http://www.wideplankflooring.com/
(800) 595-9663
Carlisle Wide Plank Floors is the premier supplier of Wide Plank Floors in the world offering Hardwood, Pine and Reclaimed wood choices. Every floor is made to order in New Hampshire.
Showrooms locations in New York, NY, Chicago, IL, Washington, DC, Stoddard, NH , and Denver, CO
Superior Woodcraft is a local custom cabinet maker from Doylestown, Pa - the heart of Bucks County.
Source:
Superior Woodcraft, Inc.
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