What carpet do you have/I want?

[itisntreallyme]

So I'm hoping to recarpet my whole house. We have hard floors downstairs so we're mostly looking at stairs, landings and bedrooms. I need it to be hardwearing and practical, soft(ish) underfoot and free from shedding. I want a fairly clean modern look in a paleish beige/cream. I'm thinking about berber but I haven't really got a clue. Oh and it has to be cheap affordable!

Am also thinking about stair runners and/or natural floorings like coir...

Where do I start?

It depends on how much commitment you want to give to keeping it clean, I suppose. My parents had a cream berber carpet once and it developed yellow stains (something to do with lanolin, apparently) and wasn't at all practical. I had a cream carpet, too, in our old house, and it was great until it was peed on by DD! Rather thatn beige/ cream, could you perhaps consider something a bit darker? I've had a gold one, too, in a rental property, and it's still going strong. I've got a dark grey one at the moment (I know it sounds gross) but it's practical, suits the decor and doesn't show any stains. I think I'd avoid coir as it's difficult to clean once dirty.

I have grey ribbed sisal type practical and looks great

No, I definitely don't have the time or inclination to spend long keeping it clean so I shall look at darker colours I suppose. And also at sisal. Thanks for your thoughts... more welcome!

You can't have a light carpet on stairs / in hallways unless you want to turn into one of those insane people who cares about their carpet a leeetle too much.

Go for something darker or patterned in those areas (those stripey stair runners hide a multitude of sins), and leave the light colours for the bedroom, where you won't be spending a lot of time tramping about.