My thought is that if you have lots of light in the house, you can choose either. If the house is kind of dark, pick the lighter color. Of course this would depend on what furniture you own or will be buying and how that goes with your selected color.

Sounds more like a design question.
Ask here.........

Here is a link that might be useful: http://ths.gardenweb.com/forums/decor/

"FYI, my contractor says he will not do any custom blends, so mixing is out. Please help!"

First step. Fire your contractor.
Mixing stains and doing a custom blend is standard procedure for any pro. The first thing i tell customer when i show them a color chart is that they ae Not limited to just those. Ill mix up whatever you want.

Those guys that say you get to choose whats on the chart or nothing are hacks and gives true professionals a bad name.

(Dont really fire your guy if youre happy im just venting. But mixing stains is simple. Saying no should raise a red flag)

Hi all, thanks for your replies. I went with Provincial after much (too much) soul-searching. Fingers crossed it looks good and isn't so dark that it requires too much upkeep. And for the record, I would love nothing more than to fire my contractor (ah, the stuff of dreams!), but we have a contract with him and are in the home stretch...

Just wanted to post a much-delayed update to this posting in the hope it helps inform someone else. We did go with the Provinicial stain on our red oak floors, which were previously natural colored.Here's a picture of how they turned out (never mind the unfinished bit on the bottom of the stairs!). I really like them but we actually could have gone a shade darker, to be honest. I played it safe and didn't want to go too dark because we have cats (and lots of fur!). But all in all, Provincial is what I'd call a true medium brown. Hope this helps someone!