ᐅ Hillside House in the Southwest Palatinate – Our Home Construction 2.0

kati1337 schrieb:

Solid floorboards probably aren't very affordable? I think engineered wood flooring might be financially doable.

Sometimes solid floorboards are even cheaper than engineered wood flooring because only one layer is used, whereas engineered wood usually has three layers.

Since we have some exposed spruce beams, we chose spruce floorboards. They haven’t arrived yet, but I hope it will look great.
Test fitting with some leftover wood pieces...

kati1337 schrieb:

Are those two different qualities? Or how do you distinguish lively parquet from less lively?

From what I’ve seen: often the "Select" grades are the calmer ones. "Rustic" grades tend to be the more lively or varied ones.

@kati1337
When I hear “Tut Tuts,” I immediately think of your former neighbor. (My father-in-law always used to turn them all off.) How is it without them?
In favor of hardwood flooring. Our hardwood is finished with a lacquer, and the quality is extremely poor. After just a few weeks, it already showed minor “damage” because the wood naturally grays in some areas, and the finish scratches very easily. It is also somewhat sensitive in places and swells quickly. This bothered us a lot in the beginning, and we were sure it would need sanding or even replacement after 5 years. After the initial damage and disappointment, it turned out to be quite durable. We have solid wood flooring in a somewhat outdated format, which made it relatively affordable.
However, I would only choose oiled flooring now. We were advised to go with lacquer because it is supposedly more durable. For homes with children, that’s not a bad choice. However, as mentioned, the flooring installer (a local company with trained staff) didn’t do a very thorough job. With lacquer, you can’t simply apply oil yourself later; you have to sand it down and refinish it.

i_b_n_a_n schrieb:

I completely agree. However, some people don’t trust my taste! 😳

Here, it’s not really parquet but rather “wide plank” solid oak floorboards, long-seasoned. The name probably comes from that 😉

Full-length wide plank oak floorboards are the most expensive boards. Only hand-laid, inlaid parquet is more costly 😉 Maybe only topped by cast floors with 24k gold inlay and precious stone decoration.
And yes, tomato sauce does disappear. For cleaning, a detergent with a care additive is used to avoid washing away the protective oil film. We have two boys, a dog, both work full time, and we are not cleaning fanatics. Around the dining table, it can get questionable at times. But the floorboards (made of pine) don’t get much damaged by it. On the contrary, you can see dirt and dust more clearly than on synthetic floors. Those tend to be electrostatic and actually attract dust and hair. Spruce would be a bit too soft for me in living areas. But I would choose oak anytime.

Oh, in winter we have washable, woven runners in the walkways of the living room and entrance, which my family regularly brings me from Sweden. These do a good job of keeping grit, gravel, and mud under control despite having a dog and children. When the kids quickly need to use the bathroom with muddy pants and rubber boots, they only register the SHOES OFF! rule when it’s already too late.

ypg schrieb:

This is ideally solved since the staircase goes down from the entrance. The right side of the plan is private.

Exactly, that’s how we envisioned it too. Someone suggested putting a door or partition here in the thread. It might be something to consider. But usually, guests behave. And if not, well, they can just admire our cowboy pinup portrait in the bedroom. 😉

ypg schrieb:

I just looked up the Modular One because of the mention, and did some googling since we also want something new upstairs eventually. I read that parquet flooring is not ideal with underfloor heating that has a cooling function. And if I remember correctly, you have a cooling function, right?

No, we have air conditioning. So that’s not a problem. In general, parquet is not quite ideal with underfloor heating because it’s slow to respond anyway. I assume many people here have parquet with underfloor heating—what are your experiences? Does it just take longer to warm up, or does it actually waste energy?

Pinkiponk schrieb:

Parquet is, in my taste and opinion, the most beautiful of all flooring options. I hope your concerns can be eased.

The concerns are mostly my husband’s. He said that if he had to decide alone, he would definitely rule out parquet. But he doesn’t see a big difference either, I think. He also probably hasn’t seen much nice parquet yet. I used to live in an old building with 3-meter (10-foot) high ceilings and solid wooden floorboards. It was very cozy.

Pinkiponk schrieb:

In castles visited daily by hundreds of people wearing street shoes (without shoe covers), the parquet still looks great despite signs of use.

Funny enough, we were recently at a Michelin-starred restaurant to celebrate our anniversary, and they had beautiful wooden floors. Of course, they didn’t look newly installed. They had that natural patina, which I found charming. I always compare it to leather handbags—they seem to get better with age.

WilderSueden schrieb:

True, I was mistaken there. In this case, I would create a transition from tiles to X next to the stairs.

Our builder suggested that too, that it could be done. There are tiles where you can create a kind of “border” to visually separate the areas. I’ve seen some nice examples (which, to my great annoyance, I didn’t save).

haydee schrieb:

@kati1337
Tut Tuts remind me of your former neighbor. (My father-in-law always turned them all off.) How is it without them?

Much better. ^^
The overall living situation here is quite second-rate. Old house, no insulation, many years without maintenance, the basement is still full of old junk, so I hope we can recover our stuff from there. But it’s quiet here. 🙂
Except when it’s the local festival, but that’s only once a year. 😉
Let’s hope it’s similar in the new housing development where we’re building. But the neighbor on the left has their carport space facing our property, and the neighbors on the right just told us yesterday they plan a 6-meter (20-foot) double garage on our boundary. So we can’t really complain. 🙂 Although I wonder how they can fit a house on their lot with just a 3-meter (10-foot) setback from the boundary and that width, but I’m sure they’ve thought it through. 😀

Myrna_Loy schrieb:

Full-length oak floorboards are the most expensive boards. Only hand-laid, inlaid parquet is more expensive 😉 Maybe topped only by cast floors with 24 karat gold inlay and precious stone decoration.
And yes, tomato sauce cleans off. You use a cleaning product with care additives that doesn’t remove the oil layer when mopping. We have two boys, a dog, both work full-time and are no cleaning fanatics. The area around the dining table can be questionable at times. But pine floorboards hardly suffer. On the contrary, dirt and dust become visible later compared to synthetic floors. Those can be electrostatic and tend to attract dust and hair. Personally, I think spruce is a bit too soft for living areas. But I would always choose oak.

Good to hear. In the past, sometimes toddlers spilled something and we didn’t clean it right away because of more urgent issues, and when you find it the next day, it’s sometimes quite well dried even on vinyl flooring depending on what the components were. You can’t really scrape on parquet, and soaking it sounds difficult too. How do you get rid of such mishaps from the previous day?

kati1337 schrieb:

I agree with you. Sure, the photos look very nice, but somehow it doesn’t feel cozy or homey? It comes across as cooler than wood.

That’s why I say: it’s all mental. But there must be people who can ignore the fact that these are tiles and just let themselves enjoy the decorative imitation. They also perceive laminate as “hardwood flooring.” Sometimes I envy neurotypical people ;-)

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