DIY Network

Flooring: Material Decisions From "Be Your Own Contractor" episode DBYC-107

In this episode of DIY's Be Your Own Contractor, the do-it-yourselfers share the experiences of having their flooring installed while acting as their own contractors. Included are the factors that went into selecting flooring materials, advice on installing hardwood and tile floors and stories about challenges the contractors faced with respect to flooring. In this segment, some of the contractors discuss the range of flooring materials that are available.

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Flooring: A Material Decision

Flooring is one of the big decisions when it comes to the overall look your home will have. There are numerous categories of material used for flooring -- wood, tile, marble, stone, concrete, manmade materials such as linoleum, etc. And there are seemingly endless choices within those categories. Three of our contractors discuss the materials they used when they supervised the building of their homes, and the factors that went into their decisions.

• For his home in Fair Oaks, California Skip Weahunt (figure A) used white oak for the stairs in the entry of his home as well as the hallways and dining room (figure B). White oak was chosen over the more standard red oak because of its brown color that had a more distinctive look and better complemented the stone work used in his interiors. Skip's desire was to use as many natural materials as possible for both aesthetic and health reasons. He used a combination of multicolored stone tile (figure C) and hardwood flooring.

  Figure A

  Figure B

  Figure C

  
  

  	Figure D
  	Figure E
  	Figure F

• Jody Cukier Siegler (figure D)stresses that flooring is one of the major design elements in the home, and helps define the style and look of the house. Jody knew that she wanted dark hardwood floors (figure E) for her plantation-style, British-colonial home in Los Angeles, California.

• The dark wood was an easy decision for Jody. What was more difficult was the decision for how and where to use other materials (carpet, kitchen flooring, etc.) in areas of the house where logistical or practical considerations were of greater importance (figure F). Where secondary materials were chosen, she still wanted to ensure that the look was consistent with an overall, unifying design. The decision for the kitchen floor was an economic one, and also was intended to provide a visual transition from the other parts of the house. The kitchen floor is less formal and safe for spills, heavier traffic, etc.

• For the flooring, as with other major design decisions, Jody researched and considered carefully how she could achieve her overall goals while finding the most economically favorable alternatives.
  
• For his finished floor, one of the key considerations for Alan Sain (figure G) was in meeting the requirements of the American Lung Association for a "health house." Those requirements recommend a hard surface since it is easy to clean and it is more impervious to microscopic organisms, bacteria, mold, etc. For his living room, for example, he opted for a concrete floor specially treated to give it the look of cobblestones (figure H).

  Figure G

  Figure H