I like to stay away from textured wood. The wire brush finish can have issues with MOISTURE stains (drool, water bowls, spilled drinks...even a little drip of olive oil can do bad things). The finish dictates how well it is protected against the nails....not the texture.

A 'sculpted' finish I'm guessing means hand scraped. Hand scraped is so last decade (sigh...2015 is over). For resale, you want to look at site finished solid hardwood floors.

Or you want a HIGH END engineered hardwood floor that has 3mm - 6mm of wear layer so you can REFINISH the floors at the time of resale.

It take sooooo much more than texture on a floor to deal with claws.

Thanks SJ - this is helpful. So when you say the finish is the determining protective factor, what finish is best to protect against dog nails?

Re water bowl - she'll have her food & water in the mud room on tile:)

Re sculpted - you can see here that sculpted is distinct from hand scraped: https://edgarandminer.ca/flooring/hardwood/

I have wire brushed white oak floors, UV oil cured, very matte looking. 2 years later our 70 lbs dog (and 4 kids) haven't been able to create 1 scratch, this floor is bullet proof! I had solid wood floors previously, I like the engineered better.

@lucky998877 - which brand of engineered hardwood do you have ? and what's the thickness and wear layer. Happy that you got a good product!

Beautiful floors !

@lucky998877 great info and so good to hear your choice has stood up so well. How does UV oil cured on top of the brush finish affect the finish? Is it more smooth - or do you still have textured look of the wire brushed?

@winstir, this black and white pic that I took 2 weeks captures the wood floor texture better. It's so beautiful, extremely hard and very easy to keep clean. I use the recommended WOCA soap bimonthly to give the floor what it needs, otherwise just water on the mop. We were worried about pushing a fridge into place...zero marks on the floors. Our young son has dropped his hot wheels cars on it 1,000 times, and nothing. Almost half of the house was installed by a flooring pro, and he said that this was one of the nicest floors he has put down in a while. We installed more than half by ourselves (during Covid, everyone was so behind on the schedule)...husband is a GC.

@lucky998877 love it - it's beautiful. Also - looks like your kitchen layout is quite similar to how ours is planned. Where is your fridge?

Thank you! Fridge is to the right of the windows...only about half of the island is showing. My kitchen is roughly 20'x22'.

How about oil stains and water spill stains?

I haven't had any problems, everything comes right out, nothing goes through the finish.

Benefits of wire brushed floors. The soft wood is removed and only the hardwood is exposed to traffic. Which is the durable portion of the wood. The downside is food gets embedded and needs to be brushed out. Or use a vacuum with rotary brushes. We have wire brushed oiled oak at home, still looks great.