Wooden flooring brings an aesthetic and earthly feel to one’s home- this being the reason for its popularity in modern houses. With an elegant and pleasant appearance, it adds a luxurious touch too! However, every season calls for some amount of maintenance that may be required for such flooring. As they say, you have to pay some price for your luxuries. Having said that, it is not as difficult as it sounds. With simple do’s and dont’s, you can maintain your wooden floors for decades.
Let us jump right into some of these simple yet effective tricks for hardwood floors.
Daily Cleaning
For these elegant home floors, regular cleaning is a must. It is advisable to use vacuum cleaning to ensure the removal of dust from gaps between wooden planks. Also, the moment you spill something on the floor, try to clean it immediately with dry or damp cloth to avoid using wet mops later. For something sticky, use ice instead of scraping it off. Scraping tends to ruin wooden polishing.
Dirt and Sand
It may seem somewhat hectic, but sweeping dust off the floor on an everyday basis is recommended for hardwood floors. Also, a no-shoe house rule is the best way to keep your cleaning efforts to a minimum. Additionally, avoid wet shoes or feet on wooden floors. You can choose to keep mats at every entry point to keep moisture away from your wooden boards.
Moisture in the air
In case your house is in an extremely humid city or just any city that experiences extremely humid weather during monsoons, you can look for having a de-humidifier at home. Proper ventilation and fan-drying the floor, will prevent the hardwood from absorbing moisture and swelling up, even slightly. Daily dry sweeping is more preferable to wet mopping for such conditions. However, if humidity is a major issue you can avoid going for wooden flooring at such places. Moreover, wood expands in the winter season and shrinks in the summer months. To avoid increasing gaps in wooden boards, use humidifiers regularly to maintain the air moisture content.
Sun Exposure
Similar to too much moisture, too much sun exposure also leads to damage of wooden flooring. You can use window blinds or curtains to avoid de-coloration of floor. Heavy sun exposure also oxidizes the wooden polish and fastens the aging process of hardwood. All of this can be prevented by regulating sunlight in rooms.
Protection from Scratches & Damage
Wooden flooring comes with a need for a particular type of care from scratches and damages from sharp objects. You can use a rug or furniture pads to avoid direct contact with furniture on the floor.
Another simple yet important tip – do not drag furniture on the floor, instead, try lifting and moving to avoid any scratches.
And if you have furry friends, make sure you trim their nails. This simple measure can go long way.
Refinish Wooden Floors
As per expert advice, sand, re-polish and refinish your wooden flooring every three to five years to maintain its look and increase durability. You can even go for a laminated wooden flooring finish for better protection from damages.
No doubt wooden flooring makes average interiors look incredible. With little extra care, you can make your home feel earthly, beautiful, and luxurious.