Things to consider while designing custom floors?

Designing your own personalized floors is the most exciting part of replacing your floors with a product like Marmoleum Click.

While designing your new floors, take into consideration the utility factor of the room – if it is a kids’ room or a adult’s bedroom, overall size of the room. If it is a huge space you may want to break it visually in 2 areas, for example Living and Dining, or Living and Family or Media room. You can achieve this either by changing the colors or the pattern design. Think about the natural light source in the room, the direction of the traffic – circulation paths. Consider the style of existing furniture in the room. What kind of ambiance you want to achieve. You don’t want to end up with hodgepodge mix of too many styles. Also, it is a good idea to stick to 3 or 4 colors in the room at the most. The overall effect should be soothing to the eyes, and not a jumble of conflicting hues.

Remember, as a rule of thumb it is best to stagger the joints while using panels. Make sure your design pattern allows this staggering. With some designs it may not be possible to achieve this, though. For example, while using all 1’x1′ squares, you obviously have continuous joints. This is something an expert will help you with.

Think of what kind of sub floor you have, check if it is fairly leveled, and go for the floors of your dreams!

P.S.  Non-residential applications is a different ball game.

Any advise for installing Marmoleum over a concrete pad?

Marmoleum Click floating floors can be very easily installed over a residential concrete sub floor. First thing you will do is, examine the concrete slab to determine its condition. Use a carpenter’s level or a straight edge to see if the floor has any significant mounds and dips. If it is not fairly leveled, you will identify the low spots where you need to fill. Begin with cleaning the concrete slab by removing the dirt and debris. Then you can fill the major low spots and dips with either quick-set mortar or one of those liquids that sets in such low areas. Use a trowel or straight edge to level the surface. If you notice any large cracks in the concrete slab, that may mean there is a underlying structural problem. Such cracks should be repaired prior to installing any new floor.

After you have prepared concrete sub floor, you can begin with a moisture barrier underlayment. Lay down a standard underlayment you would use for any type of floating floor system. At this point take a few minutes to lay your Marmoleum Click panels to see how your pattern is going to be laid out. I actually put the individual squares and panels to see how my design will start out. If you have any door entry or adjacent floor lines you need to match, this is the time to decide how your new panels will coordinate with those existing parameters.

Ideally, it would be nice to start with a row of whole squares and panels at the edge of the room. This way you ensure minimum cuts and may save time. But this may not be possible in every case. For example, you may have to start laying out your Marmoleum Click squares in the middle of the room if you need to match the frame lines in the doorway or a kitchen island. In such case you will go on laying squares in both direction in a room. Even if you end up with bunch of half panels, you may be able to use those on the other end of the room towards the edges.

This may sound harder than it actually is. I will try to explain this with visual aids at a later time.

In short, if you follow the guidelines provided here, this product can be easily installed by someone who has some experience in installing floors at home.

Have fun!

Is it advisable to install Marmoleum Click in bedrooms and hallways without transitions?

There is no problem in having Marmoleum Click in all the bedrooms and continuing in hallways, as long as the length of the floor in any one direction does not exceed 26′. If the length of the floor exceeds 26′, it is advisable to have an expansion joint.  Expansion joints are created to allow the movement in the material due to temperature changes. (Contraction in winter, and expansion during summer.) This means if any continuous segment of the floor measures more than 26′ in length, you should consider breaking it up with a transition strip. Ideally, this can be done in a door threshold for a bedroom or similar locations in case of large spaces.

In our home, we were just below 26′, and so enjoy the continuous flow without any break!