All posts tagged: Flooring

Making Spaces with Quick-Step

Published by Karen Knox

It’s been all go here at Making Spaces HQ with the makeover of our master bedroom. Last time I wrote about it, i’d just about finished all of the decorating. Remember? Benjamin Moore – Fox Hedge Tan In the grand scheme of things, the painting was by far the easiest bit to sort. I also kinda like that job, very therapeutic I find. Once that big job was done it was over to the hubster to crack on with taking up the oak flooring and lay our new Burned Planks flooring from Quick-Step. The Quick-Step ‘Impressive’ range comes in 8mm or 12mm (Ultra) boards, where as the solid oak boards closer to 18mm. So, to give us a more consistent floor height over the bedroom threshold onto the landing, we opted for the 12mm boards, as well as leaving the old underlay down and using this as our sub floor. Fitting the new underlay was super easy to do (well it was for me, as I wasn’t doing it). We opted for the TransitSound underlay which …

Vinyl Revival

Published by Karen Knox

We all know that vinyl is back in favour. But it’s not just hitting the ole gramophone again.. Nice toe tap there. It’s getting laid! Back on your floors. At home. Long gone are the days of extremely unattractive, badly fitted slip-hazard flooring. Today’s vinyl is: highly practical easy to clean none slip durable quick and easy to lay relatively cost effective warm underfoot 99% of the time compatible with underfloor heating Today’s vinyl is also extremely cool. From wood, marble, concrete, tile effect vinyl to a custom designed image of ANYTHING you could possibly imagine. The floor is your oyster. Come see. Feature Floors GRANADA BLACK SHEET VINYL FLOORING 2M WIDE: £16 PER M2 Feature Floors MARINE 2 SHEET VINYL FLOORING 3M WIDE: £16 PER M2 Best 4 Flooring MOROCCAN STYLE CUSHIONED VINYL FLOORING SHEET TANGIER 05 Best 4 Flooring BLOCK WEAVE CUSHION VINYL FLOORING SHEET FUSE 02 As you can see, vinyl in its new stylish guise can be used throughout the home, not just in your kitchen or bathroom. It’s perfect for …

The Plywood Floor – 15 months on…

Published by Karen Knox

Feature image – MADE It’s been 15 months since we laid the plywood floor in our loft space. We converted our second floor back in autumn/winter 2016 and finally completed the project in Spring 2017. Since then a load of people have been contacting me about the floor in our loft space and how it’s held up. Well, I did promise a review after a year, so I am a little behind, but i’ve finally gotten around to taking some pics of the floor as it is now, 15 months after it was laid and since lived on. Time to hand in my homework. I’ve taken some of the furniture out so you can see more of the boards for yourself. I’m really happy with how it’s fared and so glad we took a punt on an alternative flooring. Sure, it’s taken a few dinks, but then it’s a floor, so ya know, it’s what they do. In fact, it was me that gave it its first scar by rolling a mini filing cabinet from the …

We have carpet!

Published by Karen Knox

Can you believe it was this time last year that we started our loft conversion? How quickly have the last 12 months gone? We finished the staircase earlier this year and finally got the build signed off in June. Phew! But the one thing we still hadn’t managed to sort (afford) was the carpet. You can see in the image above where the old box room wall and door were as our old, battered carpets were a kind reminder of the house’s former layout. Luckily for me, Flooring Megastore were happy to work with me to re-carpet our stairs and open plan landing. Whoop! They stock an enormous range of flooring (carpets, vinyl, laminate, engineered and solid wood) including just what I was looking for. Associated Weavers Lochay – Fossil I opted for Associated Weavers’ Natural Wool Collection in a warm stone shade. I wanted something with grey undertones for more of a Scandi vibe. Especially as the space it was being fitted was all white and birch, birch and white. It’s 50/50 wool and polyester, so, super hardwearing …

Ted Baker – Did you know they did rugs?

Published by Karen Knox

Firstly, thank you to everyone that read and commented on my last blog post. I’m so glad it’s been useful to so many of you out there. Your experiences and feedback will no doubt be a massive help to everyone else too. So thank you again! If you missed it, you can catch up here. A must read if you’re planning on decorating soon. Today’s post is a bit of fun for a Friday night. I just wanted to share with you guys one of my finds this week after searching online for a rug for a client. Not just any old rug, but a marble rug. MARBOLI How beautiful is that? It’s by Ted Baker. Did you know Ted Baker did rugs? Well, you probably did, but I hadn’t seen any of these until this week. Come see some more. They’re bloody gorgeous. FLORANI Ranging from £400 to £1000, they’re not cheap, mind (surprise). Investment pieces for sure and something you’d want to have on your floors for years to come. “Woven from a blend …

To ply or not to ply – A floor quandary

Published by Karen Knox

We’ve uhmmed and ahhed about what to do with the loft bedroom flooring for ages now. As i’m going all out Scandinavian for the bedroom design, a blonde wood floor seemed the obvious choice. But then, to save some money and get this room finished in time for Christmas, we played around with the idea of simply painting the chipboard subfloor black (to which the builder just sighed and shook his head). After going around in circles for several weeks, mentally noting the pros and cons of both options, we finally decided on floor boards. Done. Having an actual floor laid meant I finally got to work with my fave joiners again, Bare Joinery. Which is always a pleasure, as they’re always up for a challenge and happy(ish) to experiment with materials, the design, the process, and most importantly, they don’t sigh and shake their heads at my less than conventional ideas. Not within view anyway. Our plan to lay floorboards sounds pretty standard, apart from the fact I didn’t want them to be actual floorboards, as …

Ethical interiors

Published by Karen Knox

Sheepskins are taking over, people. I know, it’s summer. The sun is shining (for now anyway) but more and more i’m seeing delicious, curly, soft, shaggy sheepskins draped, thrown, sometimes even strewn across chairs, sofas, loungers, beds, benches and floors. I wrote a post almost a year ago about my initiation into the world of sheepskins. Since then, my love has nothing but decupled (timesed x 10). I didn’t even know that was a word until today did you? My sheepskin love did however, feel like a bit of a guilty pleasure. I was vegetarian for over a decade based on my issues with animal welfare, but did start eating meat again when it became easier to buy organic and free-range. I do buy leather shoes, jackets and bags but would never buy or wear a fur coat. So where did I stand on sheepskins? I was unsure about how could I justify using them at home and for work. So I began searching for ethically sourced sheepskins and came across Hide Rugs, an independent, UK family business. Hide Rugs guarantee …

The (not so great) Outdoors

Published by Karen Knox

There’s one bit of our house that we’ve just not really tackled yet. It’s our awful outdoor space. Not all of it horrendous by any means, some of it is pretty nice actually. See. The offending area is our driveway and rear patio. Ya know, the non green areas. If I have just one more tradesman knock on my front door and ask “do you want your driveway doing love?” I am going to lose my bloomin rag. Mark my words. (But actually, yeah, I really do want my driveway doing.) A photo of our gross driveway from last year So why haven’t you done it then? It’s not because we’re lazy arse sods, it’s because we were going to have an extension down the side of the house, so it didn’t make sense to spend time and money on a space we were planning to build on. So we’ve just put up with the concrete/tarmac/slab disaster and focused on all things indoors. I honestly need a medal for putting up with this ^ We did make some …

Out on the floor

Published by Karen Knox

Since moving into our current home, i’ve been wanting to change the flooring in our living room. We already have a really good quality laminate laid all through our downstairs, everywhere except the living room that is. Photos by Olly Gordon “The embossed surface adds depth to the laminated floor and coupled with the bevelled edge makes for a beautifully authentic finish…. This 8mm thick laminate is tough and hard-wearing which means it can enhance even the most heavily used areas of your home, including the hallway, kitchen and living room….. It comes with an amazing 25 year guarantee giving you assurance that your laminate floor will still look fantastic in years to come…” Carpetright Carpetright The flooring has been laid in one long run with no door thresholds breaking it up. We even managed to continue the same laminate flooring into the kitchen when we had the wall knocked down to make the kitchen open plan. This continuity makes the floor plan feel seamless, totally opening up the downstairs space. It’s a natural oak from the Quickstep …