Please post pics of natural unstained walnut floors :)

9 years ago

Hi Garden Web friends,

I haven't been on in quite a while. House has taken a backseat to life for a while. We recently, however, redid our front yard/porch. The deal was I would allow all the walnut trees to be cut down IF I could make them into flooring. Well, DH agreed and now that the flooring is about to be milled he says he doesn't like walnut floors! Holy cow! What am I going to do? He wants to sell it and get oak. Our home is a very traditional southern plantation style. The flooring will go in my formal dining and formal living rooms. I've waited 20 years to get rid of the existing carpet in these rooms. Living room has mahogany furniture; dining room has quartersawn oak antique furniture. Floors would be finished on site. I've talked to three different people - all of whom said they've never stained a walnut floor.

I would give in and trade for the oak my kids no grown up playing in and around these trees. It holds special memories for me at least!

The other decision is width. The guy making the flooring says I will get less waste and more sq. ft. if I go with varying widths - 3", 4" and 5".

Please post pics and opinions! Thanks!

PS I'm going to cross-post this in the Kitchen forum as I need to make a decision ASAP and know it gets a lot of traffic!

Featured Answer

weedyacres

9 years ago

The polyurethane you use has the biggest impact on how wood floors hold up. The oil based we used was fine, the water based we used was disappointing. Unfortunately I can't remember the brand, as we sold that house.

On our current house we used water-based Bona Traffic and I give it 3 thumbs up. Light chair drags don't do a thing to it.

Keep in mind we are a no-kids/no-pets household, so we're not real hard on our floors.

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Comments (7)

gregmills_gw
9 years ago
ok just a few things.

I love walnut. even though its soft compared to other woods, I just love it.
What ever size widths you go with is up to you. if youre trying to maximize the amount of wood you get, do whatever the guy milling tell you.

Other thing is with whole logs, youre gonna get a lot of color variation, so doing random width might give you more options come install time to pick and choose which boards you want.

the other thing is You can stain walnut. you are limited to what you can stain it (colorwise) but it can take stain.

lastly, natural finish walnut gets lighter as it ages. especially in sunlight. its weird, and doesn't sound right, but as the finish ages (even with water bourne finishes) it makes the wood appear lighter...once you sand the old finish off it goes back to its original color, just something to keep in mind.
misplacedtxgal
Original Author
9 years ago
thanks for sharing Greg!
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weedyacres
9 years ago
Here's a room with ~ 5-year-old unstained walnut, oil-based poly:

Here's a room with

Walnut is so gorgeous without stain, I wouldn't stain it myself. It looks very rich with just poly.
misplacedtxgal
Original Author
9 years ago
Wow, Weedy, that is quite a difference. Not sure if I would want my floor to change that much or not.
weedyacres
9 years ago
Wait, I wasn't trying to illustrate changing floor color. I went back and re-read the thread where gregmills said it lightens over time. I wouldn't say that we experienced that in 5 years. The first photo looks lighter because there's direct sunlight streaming onto the part in the foreground. Look at the wood not in the sunlight. It's the same tone as the 2nd photo.

Here's a photo of the older floor without sunlight on it.
DEW24
9 years ago
Ah Weedyacres!!! Have just narrowed my choice down to character walnut (reclaimed locally) or character hickory. Really want walnut, but am worried about density (here we go again w Janka scale) and dogs. But weedyacres, your floors are beautiful & convincing me that I prefer the walnut. How have yours held up? From your pics, they still look fantastic. Thanks for your $.02!!