Kitchen Diner flooring

[SorrelForbes]

We've nearly finished building a7m x 8m extension to house the kitchen/diner. In the rest of the house we've retained the existing floorboards (sanded and stained teak and then given a high gloss finish) but we're a bit stuck on what to do about flooring in the new space. The whole house has quite a MCM feel and I'm bit wary of using something like Karndean in case it doesn't fit with the rest of the house.

The room is north facing and will have a sloped roof. To try and maximise light we're having three velux windows, white walls/tiles and only having base units in the kitchen part (F&B Hartford Blue)

I'm keen to just lay floorboards and give them a very neutral white oil type finish. DH doesn't think this will be hardwearing enough, especially considering that the room will get a lot of traffic.

A tiled floor throughout would probably be too cold (we're not having under floor heating) and I've not seen any kitchen diners that I like where the floor type changes between the two spaces.

Any ideas would be most appreciated!

[makushla]

I put in real wood floorboards in my kitchen/ dining / living area.
Big mistake.
The boards are well marked and they haven't had a whole lot of traffic.
If I was doing it again I would put in Karndean, Amtico or similar.

[Floggingmolly]

What's MCM?

[RueDeDay]

Mid-century modern.

[SorrelForbes]

Floggingmolly Sorry, Mid Century Modern. It's a 1950s house and we've tried to give a 'nod' to the era with the décor and furnishings.

makushla I had a feeling someone would agree with DH! . Any suggestions about type, colour?

[SorrelForbes]

Drawing of the kitchen area (the units are a greyer blue than in this picture!)

[Bluntness100]

I have the original oak wooden floorboards in my kitchen, however I had them sanded and varnished with industrial varnish so no scratches, no wear and tear. Not my fave to be honest, but it's listed and I didn't want to cover them up. If you do it have them done professionally otherwise you will struggle to maintain.

[makushla]

What's industrial varnish?

[christinarossetti]

Really, really resilient, less likely to scratch varnish. We have the same on pine floor boards, and it doesn't scratch but the wood has rented a bit in places through heels etc.

We've just had Harvey Maria tiles put in our kitchen/utility room and it's lovely. Bright, warm under foot, easy to clean, pretty much indestructible.

[SorrelForbes]

Thank you for the suggestions/warnings!

We're going to have to lay new boards before we put any other flooring on top so we've got a bit of time to have a think about this. I wondering whether a patterned vinyl tile (like the Harvery Maria ones) would be better than going for a fake floorboard effect?

[christinarossetti]

We went for the Dee Hardwicke Harvey Maria tiles as we have wood downstairs and didn't want pretend next to it.

[SorrelForbes]

Yep, that's the way I'm leaning at the moment!

[namechangedtoday15]

We have engineered oak - similar sized extension, been down about 8 months. Lovely, hasn't marked (despite 3 children and masses of footfall - we practically live in there). Not cold under foot, looks real (as it should!) and doesn't detract from other focal points (have similar kitchen but in charcoal with beautiful work top!).

I wouldn't ever ever have tiles (inherited tiles with house and lived with them for 5 years before extension, hated them with a passion) and I don't really like any of the Amtico/ Karndean/ LVF options.

[SorrelForbes]

namechangedtoday15 It's a bit of a relief to hear you say that as I spent much of yesterday looking for tiles and hated everything!

I think it's either going to have to be engineered wood or real floor boards (and to hell with the marking!).