Parquet flooring under our carpets!

[cathbath]

I am so excited about this I just had to share. We have just moved into our new house (1960s detached). It all needs redecorating as hasn't been touched for 20-30 years. I was budgeting to replace the carpets with hardwood flooring, and thinking we wouldn't be able to afford it for ages. However we peeped under the carpets last night and it turns out we have gorgeous parquet flooring throughout the whole of the downstairs! From the bits we've inspected it looks like it's in great condition, and it is stained a lovely dark brown.

I can't wait to get rid of the carpets, but DH is hesitant as he's thinking we might have to re-lacquer or protect the floor in some way before we start using it.

DD will also be potty training next year so I'm not sure if parquet flooring could cope with any accidents? Does it scratch easily with two kids in the house? I don't know much about parquet really except it was on my wish list when looking at houses!

good thinking soup, but no, there is no parquet upstairs (and no buolt in cupboards any more as M & D have ripped them all out )

Damn :) I've seen them do that on one of those property programmes.

Hi all, I'm the OP but have namechanged - I have just found my original thread through googling parquet floors, and have seen the later replies! Glad some others have found similar discoveries under carpets.

This did indeed start as a very show-offy thread, but I'm feeling rather sad about my floor now and need to make a major decision...

In the 2.5 years since we moved in, we still haven't renovated the floor. We've been getting planning permission for an extension and various other frustrating things... Anyway, in the interim the floor has ended up getting damaged. We had a pipe burst in the concrete floor, and a rogue plumber actually dug a trench through our floor in the living room, in the panic to locate the leak. I was heartbroken. We've kept the fingers and had some flooring specialists come round, and they said it is quite a tricky job to repair. Since then, we've also had bi-fold doors added to the lounge and we also need to replace our staircase - all this will mean extra repairs. There are also lots of scratches and fingers that have come loose, and it looks a lot more worn in areas than it used to.

Our best quote was over £1200 to have the floor repaired and sanded down, but the state of the floor has deteriorated a bit further since then. I think it will be quite a lengthy and disruptive job.

Someone commented last week that he didn't think it was a very good quality floor, as the fingers are only 9mm thick and it was just laid in sheets in the 1960s without much care. He also said he wouldn't recommend using a belt sander on the parquet, the vibrations could loosen the whole lot. So, it got me thinking the unthinkable... is it actually worth saving?

DH thinks not, and wants to replace it all with strand-woven bamboo throughout the downstairs. I was also thinking that if we remove the parquet we could insulate on top of the concrete floor, as we are planning to insulate the rest of the house?

Sorry for the wordy update, but what I'm asking for is a quick poll really - would you repair or replace?

We had a similar discovery in our hall when we moved here - original parquet (in our case Victorian) hidden under carpet and we only found it the day we moved in.

Ours is quite fragile now and pretty thin. Some boards were replaced when we moved in, a few of the old ones are cracking and sticking up. My trusted floor renovation man reckons it would be cheaper to replace it with similar than repair but I'm reluctant to take the original floor away.

So maybe your guy is correct in saying it might be better to replace it.

Thanks 40 - the guy I spoke to last week wasn't a parquet specialist but it did set me thinking... In terms of the disruption it would be much easier to replace, and wouldn't cost much more.

I just need to let go of my attachment to the floor somehow. We've had to replace everything else in the house (electrics, windows, doors, skirting, even the door linings) and I suppose for me it was the one thing I felt that we'd inherited that was of worth, something which captured the history of the house...

You could always take a few pieces up and frame them, as a nod to the original property?

I would probably replace, it sounds like it will cost a lot to make good. We have new parquet in our living room (approx 20ft x 10 ft) and it cost about £3.5k new.

Patricia, that's a great idea - I will try and do something like that. There is so much of the floor coming loose and being stored in boxes right now - it is just looking like more and more of a labour of love to repair.

Wow that's a lot of money for new parquet - but I bet it looks stunning. We're looking into strand-woven bamboo which is about £28 per square metre or so. We need about 50 square metres. We are looking at the solid clic stuff which could be laid relatively quickly as a floating floor.

The only problem is that the parquet is only 9mm high and the bamboo is 14mm high (plus any underlay / insulation we put down). We have already had a new wood burner & slate hearth fitted, and bifold doors with a flush threshold (designed to be level with the top of the parquet). I don't know whether we could get round these problems...

visit a few local churches and when you find one with parquet ask them who furbishes theirs.

We have a similar problem, though it doesn't sound quite as bad as yours -This is our floor We took the carpet up several years ago, and I love the look of the floor, but lots of the fingers are loose round the edges and there's a bit at the threshold to the extension where there's no parquet, which we keep covered with a mat. I'd like to keep the parquet, and fix the edges, but DH reckons we won't want to keep polishing it as we get older, and wants to put a new carpet down. We may actually get round to making a decision one day....

RustyBear, I would try and convince your DH to get yours renovated! I don't think parquet requires a lot of repolishing - perhaps a coat of varnish every few years or so? I think it would be worth it if you love the look of the floor? I personally find carpets much harder work to keep clean day-to-day.

We also have a missing threshold where we replaced a wall/window with bifold doors. The parquet specialist I spoke to said he could try and find a match (e.g. from a reclamation yard), but I was thinking we could just fill it in with a single piece of hardwood stained to a similar colour to the parquet (as it is a threshold).

When we moved in we had a massive stone-effect fireplace which had been built on top of the parquet down one wall. We've removed it but it has left discolouration to some areas of the parquet - grey faded marks. So I don't know if that's fixable.

I got my samples of bamboo flooring in the post yesterday, dropped one by accident and it dented the parquet quite badly, so perhaps it was trying to tell me something?!

I do love the floor though and don't think I could bear to rip it out... am going to at least see if it is still repairable.