So you feel your living room needs a face lift. You like the classic, rustic look of hardwood, but you realize your budget isn't going to approve a line item for traditional hardwood. Or maybe your subfloor is concrete.
No worries. Laminate flooring is the perfect solution for you. It can be installed over almost any subfloor. It looks and feels like hardwood (actually has an even "softer" feel to it because of the cushioning underlayment). It is durable and very similar in look to traditional hardwood flooring, but is a fraction of the cost. It's also a great choice financially because you can install laminate flooring yourself with a little research and good instructions.
And for those eco-minded individuals out there, laminate flooring, with its fiberboard core, is an environmentally sound choice. The core is made from scraps that come from milling traditional and engineered hardwood, so much less raw material is consumed to produce this very functional product. It's also stain and scratch-resistant — it's tough to damage a laminate floor.
The first order of business in planning and designing your new floor is the most fun — picking out a look. Laminate flooring is a prolific product and is available in every color and style you can think of.
You can get the look of light maple all the way down to dark mahogany and everything in between. And though the top layer of laminate flooring is actually a "picture" of hardwood grains, with texturing technology that has been developed, your laminate flooring planks can actually have a visible realistic, hand-scraped texture to them. Definitely not old-school laminate! You can also get planking and tiling in a range of sizes and shapes and can create totally unique designs to make your space stand out.
So how much laminate flooring do you need? You need to measure your room from wall to wall, taking into account any fixtures or elements of the room that will need to stay positioned.
Take your numbers to your home improvement store or look online for a materials calculator, and you're set to order. Installation of laminate flooring is much easier when compared to hardwood installation. Do keep in mind that you need to offset the planks so you don't end up with a "grid" of rows and columns. You just need the right underlayment and tools, which should be clearly indicated in your installation guide.
