Comfort has no boundaries in modern living. Enhancing our living spaces has become a vehicle for enhancing our lifestyles. Whether you are in the market to purchase a new condo or remodeling an existing unit, it’s important to consider a number of condo floor plan design ideas.
While it’s important to think about the flow from room to room when looking at condo floor plan design ideas, it’s also important to consider the flooring. Never underestimate the power of a floor. A floor can make a room look bold or modern, or cool and classical. Whether your style is woodsy, beachy, French country or mid-century modern, the right flooring to work with your condo floor plan design is out there.
As has been the case for a number of years, open floor plans are a given in home design. Open plans promote interaction among family and guests, as walls are not a barrier. Open plans also permit the ability to divide space for various uses, allowing for flexibility to increase or decrease the size of specific areas as occasions command. Using just one flooring material throughout the house – as is typically done in open plan concepts – helps promote uniformity among the rooms and the different furnishings you choose. A single material also helps in keeping the home design more clean-lined and uncluttered.
Below are some of the more popular flooring materials being installed in new and renovated South Florida condo floor plan designs:
Wood: A classic and elegant look, wood may be one of your best choices when it comes to long-term investment. Its classic good looks harmonize with any architectural theme or interior design, and it’s an especially good choice to create visual room-to-room continuity for homes with open floor plans. Natural wood floors in traditional widths of 2.25” to 3.25” are still popular; this year wider widths of up to 5 inches, as well as random widths in darker colors are trending. Domestic species include oak, maple and black walnut. Regional varieties, such as pecan, chinquapin and mesquite, offer distinctive grain patterns. Exotic species of hardwoods are popular in the South Florida region and include Brazilian cherry, purpleheart and African pedauk. To make sure the wood flooring you buy is harvested from sustainable, managed forests you want to look for certification from the FSC (Forest Stewardship Council) and the SFI (Sustainable Forest Initiative).
Engineered Wood: Engineered hardwood is real wood, but is more stable than solid wood and less susceptible to shrinking and expanding with changes in temperature and humidity. Technology has explored in recent years, and this flooring can be used just about anywhere. Plus, it is hard to distinguish between hardwood and engineered wood. Popular styles include oak, cherry, maple, hickory, walnut and Brazilian hickory,
Cork: A sustainable material, cork comes from the bark of a tree and is harvested every eight to 10 years. Cork has a warm, natural appearance and is comfortable underfoot. It has unusual grain patterns featuring whirls and speckles. It comes in tiles or planks with a laminate construction — a top wear layer glued to a stable core material.
Stone: Marble and granite are some of the more expensive types of flooring, but also the most durable. These materials are commonly found in South Florida condo lobbies and foyers, and now homeowners (and developers) are installing stone throughout the units. Consider marble, travertine, granite, limestone and slate. The key to long-lasting stone flooring is in the installation. The ability of stone to resist moisture and staining depends on its hardness. Softer stones like sandstone and limestone must be finished every few years with a stone sealer. Harder stones, such as granite and marble, should be sealed every four to five years. Polished stone tile can be slippery when wet, so choose stone that has a textured, skid-resistant surface for kitchens and master bath applications. Maintenance for stone is easy — simply clean with soap and water.
Tile: Tile selections for 2014 are abundant. There has been an explosion of sizes, shapes, materials and patterns. Particularly popular are large-format tiles in 24×48, 32×32, 36×36 and larger formats. Large format tiles can open up a small area and bring proportionality to large spaces. Plus, they provide a larger design “canvas,” and the opportunity for glaze patterns and designs to be big, detailed and continuous. Recycled glass tile, subway tile, stone tile, tile with lights, pebble tile and glass tile mosaics with semi-precious stones are continue to trend in bathrooms.
Carpet: Carpeting is one of the most versatile of all flooring options, featuring more colors and textures than any other type of flooring. When judging carpet quality, a simple rule of thumb is to ask about the density of the fibers used to make the carpet — the more fibers per square inch, the more durable the carpet. Carpet fibers have dramatically improved over the past few years to become more durable, with built in products to include enzyme treatments that act as a moisture barrier between the carpet surface and the padding below. After cleaning stains in the past, they would often reemerge from the padding to the carpet surface. With this new technology, accidents and spills don’t reach the padding, thereby making carpet a low maintenance element.
