I love the look of cork and we installed them in our current home a few years ago. They are being replaced next week because they did not hold up to all the foot and paw traffic. I would not recommend them if you have pets or entertain.

We have dark coloured cork throughout our house except foyer & laundry. Love the warmth & softness on the feet. No fading at all yet (3 years) even by south facing windows. Also thankful that the bowl my daughter dropped just bounced right back. Would do it again for sure!

I love our cork tiles we put in our foyer! It is noticeably softer than stone as you take that last step off the staircase from upstairs. Looks like marble-meets-leather, and is a conversation starter at times. Not sure I would do a large room with it, but I absolutely love walking on it.

We did a remodel and installed cork floors on our entire first floor 10 years ago. They've endured little kids, big dogs, trucks, balls and many games of floor hockey and still looks great. Naturally waterproof, easy to care for, stain resistant. Best remodel decision we made!

We put cork in our sunroom, kitchen and hall last year and love it. Its a natural neutral in appearance, quiet and comfortable underfoot. The tiles are 1'x 2' rectangles, which I think make a more soothing pattern than squares. It's sealed with Bona Traffic, and easy to clean. There is noticeable fading in front of a sliding door, and if the light is at the right angle you can see little dimples from a guest who's spike heels must have had an exposed screw, but those are really minor.

I do not like the upkeep. I know it is not easy to care for over the long term. not easy like genuine hard wood or like porcelain tile. I have a herd of filthy dogs and easy care is a must!!! also tile is cheap where i live in Central America.

Comfy, warm, inviting! The source lives on for 200 years! It's great!

Hate tile floors because I have a bad ankle. Cork is soft - you can feel it giving as you stand on it. I love it and would use it again for a kitchen.

I installed cork flooring in my new cabin and I love them. In cold weather the floors are not as cold as hardwood.

Love, love, love cork. If I can find the money this year to refloor this year. I ad considered using cork in the family room, kitchen and hardwoods in the rest of the house.

Kork is a very great material we are using in our products as well. Its several posive point brought us tomdevelop our unique covering product for floor, wall and sealing. If you wold like to know more about it, have a look at cortile.de write to me. Here in Brazil I am sure the market still need some years to understand its benefits but earlier or later the useres here will wake up too.

Best Fred - AUDIL | architects
bc23.com & audil.arq.br

We installed cork in our kitchen /family room 8 years ago. It has held up beautifully.

Looks like plywood. So many more beautiful flooring choices.

Don't do it if you have dogs! I have 2 big dogs and their nails wrecked it in no time....

My sister-in-law has them in her kitchen, but they faded badly in sunlight. Otherwise I would have put cork flooring in our new home.

Plan on installing Torleys Cork Flooring when our basement reno is finished. Loved the comfortable feel under foot of these cork floors.

love the bookshelf very creative and I don't know much about cork floors

They gouge way to easily, and have a hollow, echoing sound when you walk. A definite no no if you have a cat or dog.

Have a hollow echoing sound when you walk across them, and gouge way to easily. If you have a cat or dog with claws, a definite no no.

I installed cork floating floor from Cancork (Forma) last February. Followed their instructions, and it sounds hollow when you walk on it. Asked them about that THEN they said we should have used an underlayment (which they did not initially recommend, and which we would have done, but it was too late). Now, the very expensive polyurethane from Lobo (German) is peeling off. We followed their application instructions exactly--but of course, they are stymied about how this could have happened. Hasn't happened in two years, etc. Asking if we applied it properly--yes, we did if their instructions were right! Disappointed with this company.

A perfectly flat floor is a baseline requirement for any floating floor, as is an underlayment. Your issues are all due to improper installation, not the material itself.

Don't they absorb like a sponge?

We have had absolutely no problems from our three dogs with the cork floors. Green designs--we were told by Cancork that if we didn't have perfectly flat floor, that we should put down a floating floor rather than glue-down cork which was our first choice.We did the measurements, and they were within Cancork's specifications. That's my point. The poly is a different issue. Again--we followed Cancork's specifications and the poly failed.

There can be variations on how flat a floor must be like within 3/16" in a 10' span. These vary slightly between different manufacturers, but they are there for a reason. You can get hollow spots underneath your planks which when you walk on them can put a lot of stress on the locking mechanism as the floor moves up & down. As far as the finish, there may have been some contaminants on the flooring when you applied the finish or it may have started to peel at the joints that were moving up & down. A glue down cork floor can be installed but your subfloor must be pretty flat & free of contamination to allow for proper adherence.

Thank you G&K--I understand about the variations and hollowness. I just wish that Cancork had told us from the beginning that we could minimize it by adding a cork underlayment. We would have done that. The peeling is not happening at the joints, but in the middle of a couple of tiles.

I'd think it would be relatively difficult to keep truly clean like tile. I'd prefer to wear cork soled house slippers/shoes than have cork floors throughout. Sounds like a good underlay, but not necessarily better than other underlay materials. Like that it is sustainable, but how much so with all the sealing and processing?

Oh my, on the contrary! Our cork floors are the most forgiving, easy to clean floors I've ever had!! I love that they don't show the dirt and when mopped they don't show streaks or smudges like hardwoods can. They're anti-fungal, anti-bacterial and they repel water. Spills wipe right up without leaving a ring or mess. I can't speak for all cork floors. We have the Costelo ones from Lumber Liquidators and I know they perform well. You need one that is constructed well and has a good pre-finish on it. We've had ours for over a year and they look like the day they were installed. I'm no Martha Stewart but they're so forgiving and easy they make me look like I am! :)

The flooring looks great! We couldn't tell it was cork just by looking at it. The wall paint is a really nice color, too.

They are ok it kind of looks scraped up

Cork is a great eco-friendly solution. It is highly water resistant, very warm on the feet (compared to ceramic/porcelain), and a highly renewable material.

The main complaint with cork is durability. They can scratch easily, and over time don't look that great. They also aren't 100% water-proof, so if you have some kind of major flood they will expand and start buckling (especially if the click mechanism is made out of HDF, which swells when wet).

One great alternative is FloorScore Certified Vinyl Plank. The FloorScore Certification is handled by a third party to ensure the floors meet strict Indoor Air Quality requirements. Vinyl is extremely durable, 100% waterproof, and comes in a wide range of beautiful designs. Here are examples of some options:

I had cork in my kitchen and family rooms for the passed 25years, after three children, dogs cats, the floor is still going great, it never shows dirt I only damp mop each week.

I would like to update my rooms from brown cork to something more modern, I have been told that I can't put any other covering on my floor ie. floating cork, tiles etc as no glue will stick to the cork.

We love our cork so now I am looking for some way of having my floor again in cork but in a light colour.

Where can I purchase light colour cork tiles in Australian?

Robbie 2

Love all these cork ideas and REALLY think it's the answer for our kitchen/kitchen entry & hall/ deck entry/ breakfast nook! ( yes- I'm still seeking the right flooring... ) Unfortunately we can't DIY anymore and have learned that finding the right installer is at least as important as finding the right materials.

We want to install glue down tiles, stain them and then seal them mightily. Can/will anyone recommend a good pro in the Maryland /Baltimore/DC area??

Here's a more close up view of our floors. Two years of daily wear and tear, parties, etc. and they still look new. I would recommend getting cork floors with a backing that are presealed.

Love these! What kind are they?

@lovelierthoughts...those floors seen above are considered a traditional ribbon pattern. Ever cork manufacturer makes them (but not all retailers sell them). At Cancork or iCork Floor we call this pattern Silver Birch. It is the most popular pattern. We routinely sell out of it several times a year even though we try to keep 10,000sf in stock at all times. It is one of the easiest cork floors to live with.

Ours are from Lumber Liquidators, Costello Cork. We had them install and they did a fabulous job.

I love these round cork tiles. They are green and renewable (made from
recycled cork wine stoppers from Spain/Portugal) and sealable for kitchen & bathrooms!I have used them on the floor of a wine room - very appropriate there!

Here is another nice image of the cork penny tiles with light grout.

Thanks for posting more cork ideas Studio Geiger! ... I can't see any links to images though...

Thanks for letting me know, lovelierthoughts. They should be showing up now. Do you see them? Here is a close up view, too.

Yes! Thanks Studio Geiger! Really handsome!

Is tong and groove cork flooring on a basement warm enough to walk bare footed? I'm in Canada!

Good question! Cork is certainly warmer than vinyl plank/tile, laminate or engineered wood, tile. Carpet provides the most warmth, of course. How warm the cork will feel for bare feet is a very individual thing. Are you typically a person who can wear flip flops in the winter time? Lol!

Haha! we're pretty sturdy weather wise ") just used to a cozy carpet but sick of trying to keep it clean. We're gonna go for the cork and let you guys know around January how it went. Thanks so much for your response!

I would say half of my cork flooring installs are Canadians putting them in basements. The main reason: thermal insulation. In cold areas (anywhere OTHER than Vancouver/Victoria BC) the 6mm cork underlay can help warm the basement by 7 Celsius. That means you can reduce your basement thermostat by 5 - 7 Degrees to keep it as warm as it is right now! That's roughly 33% reduction (if 21 C is living temps...and you can reduce the 'stat by 7 Celsius, then that is a 33% reduction in heating costs).

Underfoot that means your feet and legs are just as warm as your shoulders. As a Canadian Cork company, we keep track of our "cold basement" installs to ensure we know the difference. It has paid off for all of my basement install clients.

www.cancork.com

I put in Forna engineered cork flooring 5 years ago in my kitchen. I chose the interlocking planks because I could not find anyone to install the tiles in the area where I live. Cancork supplied the planks I bought. It was sold as a possible DIY, but I had a remodeler do it anyway. The floors do dent, but it hasn't bothered me at all. It is a busy pattern and the dents are really not ugly. Of course, we have a more rustic style in our kitchen. The thing that bothers ma A LOT, and that I would be careful of is that the cork surface chips off and it's apparently not covered by warranty (although reading the warranty, you wouldn't know that--it's only when you ask that they "interpret" the warranty to exclude the chipping and flaking issue.) These are not gouges, they are chips. We used the very expensive Lobo polyurethane that they recommended and applied it exactly according to directions and it immediately peeled up and hasn't protected the floor like they said it would. Disappointed with Cancork and their product, but I still really love the cork. I like the way it looked, the way it felt--just think this is a poor example of the material.

Cork can be a good product under the right conditions. I wouldn't recommend cork to anyone who has pets because they will scratch the surface. However, it is much warmer to walk on and it is easier on the joints.

I'm absolutely astounded at the negative comments here. We're installing cork floors, most likely (if we can't get the polished concrete), in our new home because the new flooring installed by the seller makes me sick. There is so much more to think about than just how it looks or holds up, but even given that, I've seen comments from people who say it wouldn't hold up to dogs only to see comments from people who saw cork floors stand up to dogs for nearly 20 years and the floor still looked great. I've seen people talk about fading only to see others say their cork floor didn't fade at all. People who say cork is good on the wall but not on the floor who obviously don't understand the difference. I tested the cork flooring at Lumber Liquidators and was surprised how hard it felt. Wall cork boards are springy. A professional who doesn't recommend cork because of fading should know that there are types that don't fade. We looked at two that had been in a display window for quite some time. The stained one had faded, and I actually liked the faded color better. The natural one had not faded one iota. It looked amazing, and that is the one we're getting. I also cringe when I see information about polyurethane or vinyl coatings. Cork is wonderful, antibacterial, antimicrobial, resists dirt, dust, and bugs. When you put unnatural stuff on it, you undo all of that. You release volatile VOC's from a product that had been natural and good for people who are chemically sensitive. These people, like me, have a hard time going places because we get sick. So when people do unnatural finishes and such on their floors, it just makes one more place we have to stay away from. Which I suppose is fine if you don't like us, but will affect your health, as well. Also, if you're getting streaking from cleaning, you are probably using the wrong cleaner. I believe with cork, you have to use a neutral PH cleaner. So you may be using either an acid cleaner or an alkaline cleaner, and that is why you get streaks. I've seen this in other forums. Cork floors come with a long warranty. Ours will be 50 years. Just make sure you know how to properly care for your floor.

There do seem to be many brands of cork flooring. Perhaps the variety in experiences people have had with cork stems from that. It would be nice to hear what brand of cork flooring people used, or from where they purchased it.

We had carpet in our basement, ripped it out and then installed cork flooring. Best investment ever. They are so much warmer than the carpet in bare feet. And look beautiful. We live in Canada too. Now installing cork in our kitchen.