Bombay, India, August 30--People like to transform the ground on which they tread into the stuff of dreams, be it a sober and sophisticated marble flooring or the opulent welcome of a red-carpeted or rose petal floor, according to the Statesman Ltd.
The magic of floors lies not just in their ability to suggest beauty; the echoing sound of footfall on stone, the soft feel of a carpet, the scent of wooden floors all contribute to our feeling towards interior spaces. Floors, perhaps more than any other surface area, set the style and atmosphere of homes.
Colorful or muted, solid or yielding, this integral interior space component expresses both our own personality and the mood of the space. The judicious selection of floors must certainly address the aesthetics of these materials, but only in a strong conjunction with the other important consideration of practical appropriateness.
Some rational guidelines:
-As the actual backdrop of a room, a floor must be well-suited to the space, its use and its qualities. Also, it should accommodate future changes in the superficial elements of the decorating scheme. Rooms that grow and develop organically with alterations in taste, family size, budget or use will always feel most comfortable, acceptable and personal.
-Check the existing structural floor that will support the proposed floor finish. For instance, the structural floor for a ground floor must be totally damp-proofed, since a damp floor can ruin flooring material and cause other structural deterioration. On the other hand, a dry concrete floor can take anything from heavy stone to carpet. Yet again, while stones and tiles are good for kitchens, you may want the softness of a carpet or wood with rugs in a bedroom. Old buildings constructed with timber floor beams (a rarity nowadays) must be strong enough to take the weight of heavy stones or tiles; else just sand and paint and polish the timber, or cover it in suitable places with a thin overlay and carpet.
-Bathrooms and kitchens place stringent demands on flooring, which needs to combine comfort with impermeability, as well as coping with bare feet and grease spills. Anti-skid, well-laid, chemical resistant floors such as ceramic/porcelain tiles are strongly recommended here; softwoods (that deteriorate fast) and marbles (that stain easily) are strictly excluded.
-Address the maintenance aspect. White tiles may be your preferred look, but every dirty mark will require immediate cleaning off to keep the original pristine appearance. Further, slate is wonderfully rustic but hardly suitable for children’s rooms.
-In our climate, we are not exactly looking for the warmth of timber flooring that is preferred in colder regions. If timber (parquet) floor is your style, ensure that it is not laid directly on timber beams but on concrete or metal framework to bring in some coolness.
-Floors can act as heat stores. When exposed to long hours of sunshine through a west-facing window they collect heat during the day and remain warm well into the night. Dark solid marble and granite floors accelerate this heat absorption and retention.
-Consider floor sounds. Sound bounces off hard flat surfaces, but is absorbed by soft finishes; so a hard floor in a sparsely furnished room will create an echoing space. Counteract this by using a carpet, preferably a wall-to-wall one. Noises transmitted downwards through hard floors are a big nuisance for the residents of apartments beneath. Lets face it semi-soft surfaces like cork or vinyl can just not be maintained in our environment. The best solution is to have hard tiles or stones fixed on a floating floor, where there is a proper sound-absorbent layer separating the surface finish from the structural floor
