How to choose a parquet?

Among all modern finishing materials, parquet does not lose its relevance. Therefore, questions about how to choose parquet, what to stay on - on a laminate or a natural parquet board, are very popular. If you decide what parquet is made of natural wood is better for your rooms, then you should first deal with this material, familiarize yourself with its varieties and take into account its advantages and disadvantages. We will deal with this in this article.

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Advantages and disadvantages of parquet

A comparative review of its advantages and disadvantages will help to understand how beneficial such a floor finishing solution will be.

Pros:

• All materials used in this coating are hypoallergenic.
• In the manufacture of lamellas, they are treated with special protective equipment that significantly increases the service life and quality of use of such material.
• Installation of flooring is quite easy and fast, the main thing is to understand the essence of the whole upcoming process.
• You can lay it yourself, having previously bought only trims and a protective varnish or oil.
• It is possible to use a special lock connection, which helps to assemble this design quickly enough even with minimal experience.
• Complete imitation and identity with a natural array in texture, color and location type. Therefore, a single-lane parquet can be laid classically, with a herringbone or use more complex patterns, and even insert drawings.
• Such material perfectly absorbs various sounds and vibrations. We recommend installing a special layer - a cork, which will perfectly cope with the problem of poor sound insulation at home.
• Parquet board is neutral to moisture, the main thing is to detect it and wipe it dry in time.
• If you open the coating with oil or varnish, it will not rot and various pests will not taste.
• Under the parquet you can carry insulation elements that will only increase the natural property of the laid wood.
• It is possible to replace a damaged lamella with a new one. This is very convenient, because it is not necessary to start a major overhaul if 1-2 dies become unusable.
• This type of array is not able to accumulate statistical stress.
• Parquet flooring is able to create a special atmosphere of warmth and comfort at home.

Minuses

We examined the strengths, now we will go through the weak points, where would we go without them:

• Parquet material has low thermal and chemical resistance. It follows that thermal loads can significantly spoil the veneer, disrupt its geometry, which not only reduces the positive properties of the coating, but also causes negative customer reviews.
• When buying parquet, check with the seller the thickness of the outer material. If it is not dense enough, then it is better to refuse to purchase it in the premises of your apartment, where significant mechanical stress is possible or where there are small children.
• If you use a large number of parquet strips, then you can’t reproduce a geometric pattern or Christmas tree. In this case, decking or the usual diagonal laying of the floor is more suitable.

Important! The best parquet board will not cost so cheaply, but if you summarize all the positive aspects, the coating is not so expensive.

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Varieties of parquet

Now we will consider the main types of parquet coatings, each of which has its own distinctive characteristics:

• Piece parquet. Homogeneous wood planks that are interconnected by laying one bar close to the adjacent lamella. On the reverse side of the parquet there are special grooves that evenly distribute the load throughout the coating. They protect the parquet from damage and reduce during operation.
• Stacked parquet. It is a scarf of fairly solid wood, which creates an artistic pattern. We recommend entrusting styling to qualified professionals who can create various compositions.

Important! Manufacturers glue special paper on the upper part of the strips, which must be removed only after installation. The lower part of the lamellas is often supplemented with a special substrate.

• Parquet board. The cheapest option, which consists of several types of wood. The upper side is of poor quality raw materials, the lower side is made of hardwood. Parquet board is sold fully loaded - it is already supplemented with a substrate and coated with varnish. To mount the lamellas, a thorn groove connection is used. Parquet flooring can be laid in many ways, for example, with a herringbone, deck or frieze. The main advantage of a parquet board is a wide range and affordable material price.
• Parquet boards. The basis, as a rule, is solid wood. This design has a square shape with a size of 800 by 800 mm or 400 by 400 mm, varnished on top and ready for installation.
• Pronto-parquet. Now this type of parquet masonry has gained the highest popularity among users. It consists of a multilayer structure, where all the parts are joined by pressing and glue. Only the visible side is made of hardwood.

Important! A big plus of such parquet is the carefully derived geometry of a flat surface, the ease of installation according to the spike-groove method. Sold with or without varnish.

• With curly inserts. This type of flooring is very attractive because of the original inserts that you can choose to your taste and color. In this case, marquetry technology is used. Inside the fabric, manufacturers embed a curly insert from different species of wood. To get a stunning effect, it is not necessary to use a large number of such lamellas. To design a small room, just a few units of parquet with figured inclusion are enough.
• Art parquet. The brightest and most beautiful type of parquet flooring. It can often be found in historical museums, ancient palaces and castles. In modern use, it can be of two types - shield and typesetting.

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What is parquet made of?

Before you buy parquet as a floor covering, you need to know what wood it is made of. How to choose parquet and not regret your purchase? Now we will get acquainted with several basic options that are presented on the market:

• Oak parquet. Strong enough material, resistant to aggressive environment and easy to install. Golden shades help create a warm and cozy atmosphere in the house.
• Ash parquet. A very interesting floor covering consisting of a multi-strip wood pattern. Thanks to the yellow color, it looks unusually beautiful. It has high strength, elasticity, long life.
• Maple flooring. He, like a chameleon, changes its color over time. Immediately after installation it is white, and over time it becomes pleasantly honey. Such a coating will fit perfectly into a room with dark furniture.
• Walnut parquet. It has a beautiful embossed pattern and has a nice color. It is easy enough to look after, and the material itself is very strong, durable, resistant to various loads and cracking.
• Bamboo flooring. Much stronger than oak flooring.It does not absorb water at all, is resistant to various damage and is very durable. But there is also a significant minus of such parquet - a high price.

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What should I look for when choosing the color of a parquet board?

On the Internet and in the catalog you can’t determine the exact color of the proposed flooring, because the material is photographed by different cameras, and I process the image in different ways too. In addition, the computer significantly distorts the actual colors of the image. Therefore, only a trip to the store will help you choose the ideal parquet color:

• Try to watch parquet during the day so that artificial light from fluorescent lamps does not convey its cool shade. Indeed, most often at home we use warm light, which resembles natural sunlight.
• Lay the parquet lamella on the floor in the store so that daylight will fall well on it, just as it will happen in your apartment.
• A large-sized parquet board is never chosen for cutting. That is why in the lamella made from one type of wood, there will be a natural texture. It follows that it is impractical to look for the most beautiful maple flooring pattern.
• Varieties of parquet boards from different manufacturers can vary significantly. So, for example, the well-known grade Natur in its composition has a small number of permissible defects. This type of wood with large inclusions is used for lamellas of the darkest shades that will be tinted. As for the light parquet, it is made from higher quality raw materials, as large knots will be very noticeable on the outside of the material.

Important! Consider such a moment that even from one batch of parquet boards will not be exactly the same shade, because the tree in different parts of the trunk has a different texture and color. This is especially noticeable in the use of red wood. Even after the tinting process, some differences in shade will be visible. You can choose the most similar color for the lamellas, but you cannot achieve identity.

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How to choose parquet for home?

Usually, individual lamellas or already assembled shields are presented in the store. The bar allows you to carefully consider the cut from all sides, to evaluate its technical properties. What can not be said about the parquet board, on which only the joint and the combination of the colors of the individual lamellas will be visible. Different companies use almost the same technology in the production of flooring, but each of them can modify it according to their preferences and tastes of the target audience.

Important! Buy only well-dried wood, which is not so easy to find in the store. This process is quite long. Therefore, inexpensive parquet lamellas are often sold with not fully dried wood in order to quickly profit from the products.

A qualified specialist can easily determine the suitability of the board by sound when pressed correctly. But what about an ordinary person who does not have special experience? How to distinguish dry from wet flooring? Now we will discuss in detail how to choose parquet in the store:

• If you are staying on a three-lane board, then pay attention to the fact that its lamellas should not stick out - the top layer should be even and smooth. The exception is some wood species - cherry, birch, beech, maple. These boards allow small height transitions of the boards. But in the case of oak, this is already considered a marriage.
• We recommend staying on a quality single-lane parquet that does not have a chamfer. So you get such a parquet coating, in which the connecting joints between the lamellas will not be particularly visible.
• When purchasing a parquet board already coated with varnish, pay attention to the fact that there is no chipped varnish coating at the joints of the lamellas. This is a signal that the board was still raw. Chipped varnish is very noticeable on the floor of a dark color.
• You must have seen somewhere dark parquet with strange light lines.So, this means that insufficiently dried wood was varnished without first priming the parquet surface. During operation, such a coating will definitely crack and deteriorate, when the wood will narrow, then expand under the action of mechanical stresses.
• Take a close look at the internal cut of the board. Ideally, it should consist of identical bars, between which there is a certain space so that the wood does not expand in the summer. The exception is small errors - a few knots in the inner layer of wood. This will not affect the strength and durability of the parquet as a whole.
• The gap between the parquet bars of the inner layer should not coincide with the junction of the upper lamellas. Most often, such a picture can be found in cheap flooring. This leads to severe destruction of the varnish at the joints. Therefore, we recommend staying at a more expensive, but high-quality flooring.
• The most budgetary options for parquet have a wrong side, which is made from the remnants of plywood. Of course, this reduces the quality of the floor, but not enough to abandon such an idea.
• The thickness of the front layer is of great importance when buying parquet flooring in the store. Even if you are assured that the thickness of the top valuable wood is 4 mm, check the information yourself by visual inspection. So you know the quality of the goods offered.
• Feel free to sniff the parquet in the store. It should have a faint woody odor without various paint impurities that can harm an adult, and even more so a child. The exception is dark parquet, which is subjected to a small heat treatment - after it a foreign odor quickly disappears.
• Do not be alarmed by the slight bend of the lamella in the store. This moment is not a marriage. The best parquet board for an apartment, presented in the store when pulled out of a plastic bag, absorbs a small amount of air and moisture.

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We hope that now you will no longer be tormented by the question of how to choose the right flooring for your apartment. Let the material of your choice serve you for many years. Good luck in all your endeavors!