Cleaning parquet flooring, help please!

[Rootle]

Help please!

We bought our house 12 months ago with a beautiful parquet floor in the kitchen. I have no idea how to maintain it. Bought some stuff from Lakeland especially for parquet which is OK. Have found using a mop leaves it too wet and I worry about water getting down between the pieces and causing damage. Have wondered about a steam cleaner but not sure if they are suitable. I need to find the quickest easiest way possible to look after it as I'm going back to work soon and floor cleaning is not a high priority now let alone whilst I'm working.

Thank you for any suggestions

Is it traditional parquet ( herringbone) or blocks of small squares? we had the latter and i used to hoover it then wipe over with a barely wet mop.

If you really squeeze the mop out it should not leave it too wet.

Steam cleaning sounds a potential disaster- why would you do that on wood? surely it just needs a quick wipe over?

Wow! Fast response, didn't expect anything that quick, so thank you!

It is traditional herringbone which when we moved in was beautiful & lustrous, now it is quite dull. Do you polish yours after mopping so it is nice and shiny? When I mopped think must have had far too much water. Do you just use ordinary floor cleaner?

The only thing I have ever done to parquet is wax. Sounds like you have stripped the finish off. Ring a flooring specialist and have it looked at. If it has been sealed then I am not sure, maybe mopping is ok.

Most parquet ( we have moved since anyway and it was blocks not the real thing) is finished with varnish or wax.

You would need to buff it with a machine that does wood floors- think back to your old school hall!

I think if I were you, I'd call an expert to re-varnish/wax and give advice and meanwhile just hoover- if it's wood it should not need any water unless stains or grease have soaked in. In which case it needs some sort of specialist cleaning.

Hmmm think you're prob right, at least if I got someone else in I wouldn't feel like I was making it worse!

Thanks for the advice guys!

When I was in a rental, the management agency had a guy they used to send around at the end of a tenancy to do the floors, if you aren't with an agency, you could just ring one to ask if they know of anyone who does this, from memory it was about £50. Oh, and I did try doing mine by hand as the dog's claws had scratched the wax off in places and it was bloody hard work!