Wood or Tumbled Marble?
 My kitchen was only two years old...We had antique heart pine wood flooring. Its gone...I will admit, before the fire it was a bit "worn"looking from the dogs nails, etc. And it was only two years old... I am a big cook so I use the kitchen ALOT...Now we have to redo it all again and I am thinking maybe I should do the flooring in a tumbled marble stone instead of wood...Any thoughts? I'm thinking the tumbled marble doesn't show scratch marks, easily cleaned and in case of fire, doesn't burn up like real wood...But I am open for suggestions.... Thank you! |
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| I am sorry that you have to rebuild after a fire. I know it must be hard. Here are my thoughts, having just remodeled my kitchen a year ago: We live in an old victorian house, built in 1896. During the remodel, we uncovered the original maple floors which two flooring guys assured me were too stained to be reclaimed. Originally, we had planned to do a laminate but one of the flooring contractors talked us into an engineered wood floor: looks like wood, can be refinished a couple of times. It's beautiful BUT 1. There was a plumbing issue: our garbage disposal had a sudden huge leak: hubby and I were present and cleaned up the water very quickly: under 5 minutes, total. And very thorough, too. Floor began to show raised grain. Called contractor who called flooring guy: we let it dry out more for a few days, it was lightly buffed and re-coated with polyurathane. It looks fine. If I stand on it barefoot, I can feel some slightly raised places at edges of boards where there was water. This is not an issue for me, except that I know I would not make the same choice again. Am a bit frustrated because we asked specifically about water since it is in a kitchen. Contractor has it in his own home. Anyway, the plumber's mistake caused the leak in the gargabe disposal and his insurance payed for the damage. Considering what I paid the plumber, I think it was fair. 2. It is very, very easy to see where our dogs round the corner going from the dining room to the back door on the new floor. And was very quickly: within weeks. Now, we're dog people and not fussy about having everything immaculate so I'm ok with it. Fussy people would not be. And we did know wood would show wear more than tile or linoleum and actually wanted a lived in look. It got that look pretty fast. Something to consider. I would look into this issue more if I were doing a kitchen again. Here's why I didn't chose something like tile (could not have afforded marble, which is beautiful): We actually use our kitchen all the time, which means we stand and do prep, stand at the stove, do dishes, etc. We're not as young as we used to be and I frankly felt a harder surface than wood (which has some give) would be too hard on our joints, especially hubby's. I don't know if this is an issue or not, but I would also worry and investigate whether the marble would stain. We spill plenty. And use a lot of tomato sauce. Worth asking about. If hardness/unforgiveness of flooring doesn't bother you (we drop a lot, too: not everything breaks on wood that would on marble or tile) and you feel ok with staining, marble can be a beautiful look. ETA: If I understand it correctly, oak is harder (i.e. less likely to scratch) than pine; maple is harder than oak. My floors are a maple engineered flooring. |
| Are those the only two options you're considering? |
| I'm a big fan of Mike Holmes on TV.....a contractor. Have all his books. He states: NO wood where water can occur; floors or around sinks. No engineered, laminate, planks, etc. As you found, the slightest leak will be trouble. When you consider all the possible water leak sources in a kitchen, you are playing roulette with wood. Just finished having the small master bath redone (before we fell through the rotten floor..speaking of slow leaks) and our house would qualify for one of Mike's shows. The fireman who built this must not have had a ruler or straight edge. Studs vary from 12-16 inches on center, nary a flat wall or proper corner......sigh. Truly creative plumbing...... I seriously question this house received proper building inspections, or the inspector was a relative. Where's Darcy?? Our kitchen designer?? |
| We currently have cherry hardwood in our kitchen and (knock on wood!) haven't had any problems with it. Yes, it's scratched a bit from Barney, but to me not in a detrimental or very noticeable way. It's almost 4 years old at this point. We just put in bamboo floors in our master b/c that's one of the harder woods and was told it could withstand Barney's punishment. So far so good, but it's only been a few weeks  I'd think some sort of tile or stone floor would be nice to have in a kitchen, as long as it isn't porous. We had tile in our last house and that was really nice (especially since we were housetraining Barney). As for stone being harder to stand on, they have really nice cushy kitchen prep mats that look nice too that you can strategically place where you'd be standing a lot, like the sink or the stove. |
| My parents are installing this green friendly wood (engineered) right now-- it's so lovely and I couldnt believe how durable they were.. At first I was dubious because I had installed bamboo floors for my house in NY and they scuffed easily. London has no mercy on these floors and he runs like a horse. I tried explaining that to my parents (as they have 2 dogs themselves) and they assured me that the floors they picked were durable (and even tried sawing on it- not a scratch) and wow, they were right. Gorgeous - looks like real reclaimed wood. I'll find out the name... |
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