tell me about your Bamboo or Laminate Wooden floor please!

[ArtemisatBrauron]

We have just moved in and are looking to replace the tatty old carpet in the living/dining area and hallway with a hard floor. We can't afford full-on wood, but have been looking at bamboo as a "solid wood" alternative to laminate... advise me please!

[cleopatrasasp]

After reading some recommendations on here I settled for carbonized bamboo flooring from the bambooflooringcompany.com for my hall and I really love it. It looks beautiful and is very hardwearing - my joiner said it blunted two of his cutting blades and was 'hard as teak' when he was fitting it. If you do get nicks and scratches they tend to be almost unnoticeable unless you look very closely. I didn't chose it because it was cheaper than wood as I was lucky enough to be able to afford wood at the time, I chose it because I read that it was more robust and hardwearing than wood and that was very important to me as it was going in an area of high traffic. The fact that it was a lot cheaper was an added bonus. I am decorating my kitchen next and will be using it as the flooring in there as well.

[cleopatrasasp]

Spectacular link fail there, the company I used were: www.bambooflooringcompany.com/

[poppingin1]

Bamboo is fantastic from my experience but I personally don't always like the look of it, unless it is in a darker colour. For durability I would highly recommend it though.

[FriskyHenderson]

We have solid bamboo from Wickes. The guys fitting it said it was incredibly easy as very uniform. The only issue I have with it, is that it's very lacquered - so large amount of varnish on top meaning it scratches. The real oak we have, has lots of dents, whereas the bamboo has scratches instead. Not that I've done anything with it like sanding and trying to re varnish, mind

[cleopatrasasp]

That's interesting Frisky as mine hasn't scratched much at all, perhaps it varies depending on where you buy it from? I don't have oak though so have nothing to compare it with.

[serendippity]

Loved our bamboo floor! (moved house in December, and against my better judgment had to leave the floor behind ) was always warm, pretty hard wearing, and looked gorgeous. Also very good for conscience as it grows spectacularly quickly so quickly replaced when cut down. We had a light colour bamboo, which did scratch under the weight of massive 40 k Weimaraner BUT the were actually pretty hard to spot unless you knew they were there.
Now living with stoopid laminate right through the downstairs of a largish house- so can't afford to replace it yet, but when we do I would happily go for bamboo again.

[AnythingNotEverything]

Have you looked at engineered wood? It's cheaper than solid wood and hard wearing.

[FriskyHenderson]

Cleo it was cheap as chips and tbh the reviews on the Wickes website were clear about the lacquer issue. Less lacquer - not a problem. Or less DC scraping furniture around their rooms.

[PrincessFlirtyPants]

It's not something you have mentioned but I only use waterproof 'wooden' flooring, it looks better than laminate is completely waterproof. So compatible with children, pets and floods!

[cleopatrasasp]

Those pesky DCs and their floor scraping Frisky. [GRIN] My friend had a new carpet put down recently and none of her children were allowed to walk on it for three weeks - after which she realised this just wasn't practical in the long term, however lovely the carpet looked!

[cleopatrasasp]

Oh dear, smiley fail, excuse me everyone.