Suitable floor for old cottage

[LaBelleDameSansPatience]

I live in an oldish cottage (c. 1900) in a village. Most of the decor is rundown and scruffy very traditional. There are cheap wooden parquet floors approx 20 years old which are moving and lifting and generally unattractive and hazardous. Under the wooden flooring is concrete. What kind of flooring would be economical and look good? DH hates carpet.

Not sure about economical (they are expensive to install but will last another 100 years) but quarry floor tiles would look good (you can have rugs on top etc.

Got ours from www.aldershaw.co.uk/handmade_floor_tiles and they are handmade and honestly look totally original, people have come in and said 'at least you're lucky that the original floor tiles have survived'!

I would go for the best laminate that you can afford, wood look. It will look nice, it will last and it will be warmer than tiles.

We have got terracotta tiles everywhere downstairs. They look lovely but are a pain to clean and are freezing in winter. I would go for wood or go for underfloor heating if you want tiles/stone floors.

Can't face the thought of installing underfloor heating....floor is freezing anyway, with just a thin layer of wood on top of concrete; never wear slippers - fleece lined boots all winter. .... Going to visit a tile shop this morning, might drop into B&Q to check out laminate as well. Was wondering about linoleum (but don't actually know what it is).

I'd put engineered wood in with insulation under. Wood will be warmer than tiles and won't go out of fashion. Get it thick enough to sand and you need never change flooring again. Alternatively stone (limestone?) would be in keeping and light enough not to make the whole place really dark. I have both wood and stone in my cottage, so not biased at all .

Engineered wood??

Checked out linoleum ; doesn't like moisture, so no good in old, cold, damp cottage.

Are you sure that it's cheap wooden parquet, and not expensive parquet that needs redoing? If the latter, there is a big market in reclaimed flooring!

I don't know how i'd tell the difference ... it's quite thin and is in sheets of little squares. I have now found out that every square inch of glued concrete will need to be scraped by hand ... just throwing mats over dangerously lifted bits is looking better!