What to cover parquet floor with?

[Nopreservatives]

Our hall has an old 1960s parquet floor, in very poor condition due to 40+ year being covered with carpet and no care being taken when decorating, by the looks of things.

The floors in the adjoining room have been done so that they are level with the carpeted hall, ie the parquet has a very small (1.5cm?) difference to the tiled floor in the kitchen and the carpet in the living room.

I had planned to have some other wooden floor put over it, but the fitters won't do it becuase of the risk of the floor underneath "blowing". Vinyl is a possibility, but the pattern of the parquet is likely to come through.

Is carpet the only option, other than taking it up and having the floor built up to adjust the levels?

I might consider having it renovated, but we'd still have the issue with the levels.

Carpet is the quickest and simplest and will absorb the little bumps to a certain degree. Personally I'd prefer to glue the parquet down where it's lifted, sand it flat and re-seal then get a threshold that ramps over the height difference.

The level shouldn’t be a massive problem - many of my floors are on slightly different levels, but a threshold strip across the doorway covers the gap and you don’t notice that the room is slightly higher or lower. Renovating parquet will be messy, but you can at least contain that if it’s in the hallway and if you hire a sander and have the one it’s easy to do yourself. That would be my option.

I definitely wouldn’t put a solid floor over the top of worn parquet, agree with your fitters there.

The ideal job would be to remove the parquet, relevel the floor so that when the restored parquet is laid again, it's flush with the other floors. But your front door might be an issue? Guess you could get it planed?

I would have it sanded and oiled then get a wooden strip (from any wood floor shop) to put between the wood and carpet to make it feel more level.

Do not cover your parquet!!

I do quite like the idea of having a got at it myself, but I'm scared if the mess!

We also have the issue that it looks like the skirting boards were fitted with the carpet in situ because they don't quite meet the parquet

you can put vinyl over it, previously covering the floor with thin (usually 4mm) ply so that the pattern of the subfloor does not show through.

this is also done for floorboards, where the pattern of the boards and the cracks between them would show through vinyl and cause wear lines.