“Your new wood floors are beautiful!” your neighbor gushed. “How are you going to keep them that way?”
“What do you mean?”
“You entertain more than anyone I know. And the holidays are just around the corner.” The expression on your face must have betrayed the panic you felt at that moment because she quickly reassured you, “I’m sure it will be just fine.”
Still, you couldn’t stop thinking about it for the rest of the day. How would you protect your new wood hardwood flooring? That night you did a little research and learned that quality wood floors aren’t any more difficult to care for than any other kind of flooring. They are just different. With a little preparation, they will make it through the holidays looking as gorgeous as ever!
The first thing you should do is protect your wood flooring from your furniture.
All furniture has the potential to mar wood flooring. So it’s important to put something protective between the feet of your furniture and flooring. There are a variety of products available in big box stores and online. Some of these products work better than others.
Let’s start by looking at furniture pads.
Some furniture pads have a plastic surface. These are great if you have carpeting because they enable you to easily slide heavy pieces of furniture such as tables and sofas over a carpeted floor without getting “stuck.” Unfortunately, they can injure your wood flooring, especially if it’s made of a softer wood such as pine.
The most popular furniture pad surface for use on wood floors is felt. It moves easily across a wood floor without digging into the floor. These felt pads come in all sizes. You can even buy felt that can be trimmed to fit unusually shaped furniture such as the bottoms of a rocking chair.
The next thing to be aware of is how the felt pad is attached to the furniture.
Something has to hold the pads into place under your furniture or they will slip right off once you move your chair or table. There are pads that come with an adhesive backing, but they tend to slip off easily. T Not only do they no longer offer protection at that point, but the sticky adhesive gets all over your floor making a mess that is tough to clean up. There are some solutions to this problem.
- Glue the pads to the bottom of your furniture
- Purchase pads that can be screwed or nailed to the bottom of your furniture
If you are going to nail or screw the pad to the bottom of your furniture, it’s a good idea to drill a small pilot hole where the screw or nail will be. This prevents the wood from cracking and splitting
Schedule maintenance for your furniture pads
It’s easy to forget about the pads under your furniture. If they wear down, they can gouge your floors. You should schedule replacements for them once a year, every year. Mark it down in your calendar and give your furniture fresh furniture pads.
Another concern is rubber backed rugs
The chemicals in rubber can permanently discolor or mark your floors. Never use rugs on your wood flooring during the first 2 weeks. After that, you may use rugs on your flooring so long as you prepare it properly.
- Lay your carpeting on the floor with the rubber backing facing upward.
- Trim carpet padding to the size and dimension of your carpeting, minus ½ inch.
- Tape the carpet padding to the carpet using carpet tape. Just run the tape around the perimeter of the carpet. The ½ inch overhang will give you the space you need.
- Turn the rug over. Now you can safely place it anywhere you like.
More recommendations
Clip Rover’s toenails and ban high heels (and all shoes) from your floors to keep them from getting scratched and dented up.
You can find more recommendations for maintaining the beauty of your hardwood floors on our maintenance page. We also carry a variety of products to help keep your floors clean and looking like new!
If it’s time to sand and refinish your flooring, contact Dave’s Floor Sanding today!