Karndean / Amtico tiles - do they ever look or feel real

[furryfriends57]

I've seen loads of threads on using Karndean / Amtico wood effect range and people seem happy with them and that they look convincingly like wood. I dont have underfloor heating and with two under two I would like tiles in the hall and open plan dining room / kitchen but worry about the bruising, the trips to a+e, breakages etc if I opt for porcelain. I've seen the Karndean tile range in a shop and like the look of it but wonder about what it would be like in real life - would people immediately know it was just expensive vinyl as soon as they'd see / walk on it. If anyone has an expanse of Karndean / Amtico tiles please please let me know what it looks and feels like and if its in any way convincing as a tile. Thank you thank you .....

I think karndean is so expensive that if you want wood or tiles why not get them? It is like brick effect wallpaper! I allowed a local flooring company to tile a flat I was developing for free in about 2006 when they first started karndean. It was terracotta effect tiles with a grey strip meant to be grout.Took ages to lay and looked terrible when done even though they fitted it well but with all the original things in the house it stood out. lalouche I love colourflooring

I personally hate kardean/amtico and like others think it looks plasticky. It's also expensive for what it is - posh/ branded plastic floor.

I have always had porcelain tiles in my kitchens - I have slipped and fallen once when running in my socks but I've also done this on my dads amtico floor and it hurt just as much on that as the real tiles.
My 5yo DS has never hurt himself on our tiles and he's a magnet for daft injuries.

I've dropped things on the tiles that have broken but I've also dropped things and they've been fine. TBF we've had wineglasses dropped on the vinyl in the conservatory and they've broken too - it's the dropping that's breaking stuff not so much what it's dropped on.

The porcelain tiles in my old house were 10yrs old and looked as good as new, they were easy to clean (make sure they have grey grout) and indestructible when the idiot movers dragged heavy appliances across then.

We are about to fit a new kitchen with a new porcelain floor. The joiner making our kitchen was dead pleased we weren't going for 'posh vinyl' as he said it's so easy to scratch.

It's a good point about the cost. I was astonished that some Karndean was up to 60 or 70 pounds a square metre - for that you could get an extremely beautiful, extremely high quality wooden floor!

"I think karndean is so expensive that if you want wood or tiles why not get them? It is like brick effect wallpaper!"

Except its not. My amtico 'wood' floor didn't have any gaps, or grout to get dirty like real wood or tiles and was a breeze to clean. I think there is a big difference to what people perceive to be wood/ tile effect flooring and what it actually is. Things have moved on and the quality of these are extremely impressive.

My solid oak floor and porcelain tiles/grout never collected dirt, even with my laissez faire approach to housekeeping after 10yrs they looked great. If laid properly they are hardy and beautiful and don't have to cost the earth.
Badly laid posh vinyl is just as bad as poorly laid other floor coverings.
The trick with all flooring is to lay it right.

My wooden floor has no gaps either!! And if it gets too many scratches, i can sand it down and it'll look brand new again. And repeat several times if need be over the years. I looked at all this stuff not 6 months ago in some depth. Still think karndean is horrible, sorry!

I have to say I'm surprised at all these people talking about the "plasticky" feel of Karndean/Amtico and how it obviously doesn't look "real". When we had Karndean "wooden" floors, everyone who saw it assumed it was real wood and the standard response we got when we said it wasn't was that people would seem surprised and bend down to touch it.

Its clearly a divided topic - either love it or hate it.
And true, a lot will be down to how its been laid.

I know it has 'moved on' as in the wood effect is better etc but I see it at work all the time and it never looks as good Sorry! Real wood and tiles aren't dirty if you aren't . It is the hyacinth bucket of floors hides thread and runs

we have karndean in our hall and kitchen. we were going to go with wood but our problem would have been that wood is 18mm thick whereas karndean was only 3mm thick. we have stairs in both rooms and it was going to be too difficult to deal with the differences in heights at the top of stairs, its easy to hide a 3mm piece of karndean but not so easy to hide an 18mm piece of wood, and between rooms to put wood down.

we dont pretend the flooring is wood but everyone who sees it asks where we got our wood, once we tell them and show them a spare tile they are really surprised. it doesnt feel any different to walking on lacquered wood as it does walking on karndean/amtico.

So many replies thanks so much. It seems that Karndean / Amtico are the marmite of the flooring world because everyone either loves them or hates them. From the replies the tile effect is rarely used by MNers and anyone who chose to use the wood effect was happy with it. I have asked flooring shop to let me see homes where they have laid an expanse of tile effect so I can see it in situ and decide then. I'll report back