Grass-stained jeans often hide little legs that can run into a house, plop down on a couch that sits on a beautiful hardwood floor, and kick muddy sneakers off with a jolt that sends them sailing to the unreachable galaxies of the under-couch world. As the muddy sneakers are left forgotten on the hardwood floor, mud and dirt slowly seep into the wood. Dampness starts warping the hardwood, and as grains begin to roughen, stains set in. When it’s time to move furniture around for spring cleaning, dark stains on the hardwood floor show evidence of long-lost sneakers under the couch and overflowing water from plant holders hiding in the corners of the room. Once the room is cleared of furniture, it’s clear that spilled beverages from the last family reunion were not quickly wiped up. Life leaves stains. (more…)

Cigarette burns are unforgiving. Their dark, scraggly perimeter scowls at you and taunts you with
a scorched noticeable, often permanent, hole – ruining whatever surface was trying to survive. It’s very hard to hide a cigarette burn, and many cigarette burns are impossible to hide or repair. If your shirt went up in flames and is reduced to flying ashes, it’s time to get a new shirt. A car seat cover may be necessary to hide that cigarette burn from mom, and you might need to strategically center a floor planter over the carpet of your rented apartment. But, depending on the severity of the burn, there may be hope. (more…)

There’s nothing like the feeling of real wood. Sure, plastic laminate is cheap and easy and can emulate the pattern of a real hardwood floor; but it won’t fill your home with the timeless naturalness of real hardwood. Hardwood floors have an elegant, but subtly strong and rugged essence that fills a home with the feeling of open-air spaciousness. By combining one hardwood color with a darker border around the perimeter, perhaps with four intricately-patterned decorative granite corners for an added touch, you can still achieve polished sophisticated designer looks – without the vacuuming. (more…)