Is there such thing as nice carpet?

[Quodlibet]

We are choosing flooring for new loft stairs, loft bedroom (children's room) and I'm thinking we might as well replace the minging brown hall and living room carpet while we are at it. We are a first floor flat so think for the sake of downstairs we need to carpet rather than strip floors in hall and living room.

Problem is I hate all the carpets I've looked at. They are all boring shades or too shiny or just remind me of middle aged relatives' houses.

I like the look/warmth of e.g. sisal but it's completely impractical.
Can't have loop or textured as we have a cat.

Help? I need something that is reasonably hardwearing but not dull and hideous.

I also don't really like carpet, but we carpeted upstairs (bedrooms) for the sake of warmth (ds's room is above the garage). We managed to get 2 x off cuts of some very pricey carpet at very good prices. Big enough to do our bedrooms anyway.
It's thick and dense, but not fluffy. Lovely and warm, lovely to walk on. Plain beige colour, very similar to the oak floor we have everywhere else. Very neutral. 18 months old, still looks new. Apparently should last 20 + years. 80% wool, 20% poly, it's called Westex Gold.

Thanks BikeRunSki. Can I ask where you sourced it please?

You could try Roger and Oates. They do some lovely ones but they are expensive.

From a local carpet shop. The Carpet Barn in Huddersfield.

Nice carpet is always wool. Synthetic carpets are sweaty underfoot and look cheap, IMO.

You'll never find a synthetic carpet in an upmarket home.

I think one other thing I don't like is the texture of twist carpet, unless it is very short and very matt. Is boucle a no no with a cat?

I walked on a synthetic carpet with bare feet the other day. It felt squeaky Wool all the way.

See I'd agree re wool, except we have moths which are pretty much endemic in our part of London. There is no such thing as moth proof wool carpets, is there??

See I'd agree re wool, except we have moths which are pretty much endemic in our part of London. There is no such thing as moth proof wool carpets, is there??

See I'd agree re wool, except we have moths which are pretty much endemic in our part of London. There is no such thing as moth proof wool carpets, is there??

My friend hoovered and the carpet came away and was totally destroyed - the moths had killed it :-(

I am a carpet hater, but thinking of putting some in as an easy cheaper option upstairs. I have seen some nice shades in Victoria Twist. It is a short pile 80/20 wool in 40/50 oz. There are some nice neutrals that will work well with contemporary colour schemes or transition from oak floors. The colour I am looking at is 'cool ivory' but there are lots of choices. They had tjis on sale at my local Tapi.

Surely if you Hoover regularly moths should t be an issue as its the larvae that eat the wool, no?

Like everything there are carpets and Carpets, try looking at Brintons, they have an excellent range of plain and patterned wool carpets. No shine or crunchy textures in sight!!

Yep we have moths and battled them in our last flat, where they ate the wool carpets. Unless you can Hoover regularly under ALL furniture they will find somewhere to hide.

I've been looking at Victoria Twist 'chiffon' today actually for similar colour reasons Tremolo and now trying to find a cheap supplier - what is Tapi?

We have to do the children's bedroom even if we put off doing the hall for a bit. I'm currently advocating stripping the landing and painting the new loft stairs charcoal grey for the time being. DP is resisting this plan because of 'clunking'.

We've just ripped out manky carpet. Only a few years old but a cheap not nice type. We are going floorboards but there are some nice (albeit expensive) carpets around. Most people I know seem to think it's peasant like not to have carpet, so weird!

Be interested to see what you choose as we will re carpet the bedroom at some point too.

Following this thread as we've moved recently and need to start buying carpet for the bedrooms as we renovate. The previous owner has used that nasty, flat synthetic crap, the only benefit of it is it stops us walking on bare floor boards. We bought good quality carpets for most of the bedrooms in our old house and 11 years later they were still lovely as they washed really well. The independent shop we got that from closed when the owner retired and we tried to match it from a big chain and it was horrendous, cheap and nasty and came up no cleaner when washed.

Tapi is a carpet/flooring warehouse, there is one near me on a retail park that also has a CarpetRight and SCS. You can see if there's one near you here They are pretty competitive price wise against carpetright but I haven;t used them yet so can't comment on service - they can;t be any worse than CarpetWrong!

Another option if you can be bothered to coordinate it, is to find it in one of the online warehouses and find an independent fitter who is prepared to fit a carpet they haven't supplied. I struggled to find anyone near me and when I did find people, they just messed me around. You may have better luck though.

Wool is key. 80% if you can afford it, 50% if you need something cheaper. The moths are a problem. The chemicals that used to keep them at bay have been banned now (and were probably the reason a lot of people I knew in the trade (family business) got cancer at an unusually young age).

Surely if you Hoover regularly moths should t be an issue as its the larvae that eat the wool, no?

Should do, but this happened when my friend moved her bed to hoover under there. Which is more of an occasional thing. For me anyway!

Are there ANY nice synthetic carpets? I need to get new ones as the moths have wrecked mine, and I have small rooms so it's really hard to move the furniture regularly for hoovering.

Could you pop cedar blocks under the bed to discourage the moths? I have no idea if they work but might be worth a shot to avoid synthetic carpet.

I used to hate the idea, and the feel of, synthetic carpets, but a dd has recently recarpeted a spare room with some, and I was so surprised that it not only looks so nice (previous owners' choice was horrible!) but also felt so comfortable under bare feet. She wanted a synthetic for practicality - any stains can be easily washed out, and it's a room where she will have children staying.
Synthetics have evidently improved no end since I was last looking at carpets.