If you’ve been paying attention to hardwood flooring trends in Detroit lately, you know that wide flooring planks are very popular. They mimic an older style of creating hardwood floors, as well as adding a sense of space to smaller rooms. However, a new trend has begun to emerge to coincide with wider planks. Many homeowners and businesses are also choosing longer planks. The longer planks are often wider as well, but they don’t have to be.
Why Longer Planks?
People are choosing longer planks for a few reasons. For one, longer planks of solid hardwood tend to come from older trees. That means that the wood will be higher quality. It will also contain more heartwood. Heartwood is the wood that is at the center of a tree. As that wood processes water and minerals, it eventually becomes clogged with minerals and oils. That buildup will eventually render the wood unable to spread resources. It will also make the wood more richly colored. The longer a tree is allowed the grow, the more heartwood it develops. So, a longer plank floor will likely have richer color.
Secondly, longer planks have fewer joints in them. Everywhere two pieces of wood touch each other is called a butt joint. When you use short, skinny planks, you’ll have hundreds or thousands of butt joints. That can make a hardwood floor look very busy. If you want a less disrupted look, wider and longer planks is the solution.
Thirdly, longer planks are easier to install. Each plank has to be secured on both ends. Some engineered planks are also affixed to the planks to the side as well. Longer planks means that you’ll use fewer planks, which means that there will be less work.
The Look
Longer planks lend the same subtlety to rooms as wider planks. Since they have fewer interruptions, they tend to make smaller rooms look bigger. The look is also one that hearkens back to earlier hardwood floors.
Hardwood floors had wider planks for the same reason they had longer planks. Someone had to cut and mill the wood by hand. Cutting it into smaller planks was just more work with very little added benefit. So, the crafters left the planks as long as the tree would bear. Varied length planks are related to this trend. These are planks of differing lengths installed on the same floor. The choice could be practical and/or aesthetic.
Interested in installing new hardwood floor in Detroit? Call Natural Beauty Wood Floors today to schedule your in-home consultation.