Stylish Design Tips for Decorating With Hardwood Flooring

29 October 2021
Stylish Design Tips for Decorating With Hardwood Flooring

Hardwood flooring is a design statement as well as a versatile and practical flooring choice. It brings a beautiful natural texture that complements many rooms in your home, bringing a warmth that you may not expect. Because luxury wood flooring can make such a bold statement in a lot of rooms, some people may be left wondering how to decorate with it. Maybe you’ve chosen light oak flooring and you don’t want to overpower it, or dark wood flooring and you’re worried about overwhelming the room with more patterns.

Here we’ll provide decorating ideas to help you finish every room with hardwood flooring.

Why choose solid wood flooring?

Hardwood flooring is a stunning addition to your household, but if you still need persuading, here’s why you should choose hardwood:

  • It’s environmentally friendly – Hardwood flooring is renewable, recyclable and 100% natural so reduces the amount of carbon emissions in its production. It also doesn’t require harsh chemicals for cleaning as carpet does, so you reduce the number of pollutants being emitted.
  • It adds value to your property – Although there is no figure on the return of hardwood flooring, property valuers won’t underestimate the value of a high-quality well-fitted hardwood floor.
  • It improves with age – Luxury wood flooring lasts decades and can be restored multiple times to give you a new finish whenever you want to switch it up. It will last much longer than cheaper alternatives like laminate wood flooring.
  • It’s easy to maintain and clean – Hardwood floors won’t get ruined by spilled food or drink and can be easily cleaned up as opposed to carpets. Rather than needing to buy the latest expensive vacuum cleaner, hardwood floors just need a quick sweep and mop.

Choose a complementary colour palette

Selecting the right colour scheme will help you compliment your hardwood flooring. The best way to determine which colours will best go with your flooring is to look at the undertone of the wood. You may find subtle hints of yellow, orange, red, grey or brown in the finish. You can then use your findings to select complementary colours from the colour wheel. For example, warm tones of red can be complemented with tones of blue and yellow can be complemented with darker blues.

However, you can use trial and error to decide which colours go well with your flooring. It may be worth picking up some paint samples to help you decide.

Vary materials across furniture and accessories

You don’t need to match all the other furniture in the room with the wood flooring, it would probably be too heavy for most people. Instead, balance the wood nicely with different materials. Hardwood flooring goes well with leather, metal, woven fabric, concrete, marble and glass, so pick materials you love and find furniture that will look great in your room. Think about adding upholstered seating, glass tables, accent furniture or wall art. You can add wood accents in more subtle ways like the legs of furniture and picture frames. This will tie the room together nicely without being too obvious.

Continue wood floors throughout rooms

The best way to make your house feel seamless and cohesive is to continue the solid hardwood flooring throughout the rooms. If you have an open floor plan, it will look much better if you stay away from using different types of flooring. Creating a natural flow in your home will help you avoid awkward spaces and make the space feel bigger than it is. This will help make your home look more aesthetically pleasing, increasing your property value and also being much easier to clean.

Contrast dark wood flooring with light colours

Balance the room nicely by contrasting dark wood flooring with light colours. White is a great option as it provides a clean, fresh and modern look that pairs nicely with the deeper colours of the wood. You could add white couches, rugs and chairs paired with dark walls and floors. Keeping the furniture and flooring monotone provides you with the opportunity to add bursts of colour in the form of artwork, cushions lamps and throws.

Soften wood flooring with rugs

Wood flooring can often feel quite empty and harsh if not softened with other furnishings, making you feel like you’re living in a showroom. Furthermore, repeated walking over hard flooring isn’t as comfortable and homely as soft flooring. This can simply be altered by adding rugs to your space. It breaks up the floor a bit more and provides a warm and cosy feel. Rugs will help to minimise the impact on your body and add comfort. This is also a great addition if you have any pets, they would much rather sleep on a soft rug than solid wood flooring. You could even layer two rugs to add more dimension to the room and anchor sofas and chairs into a cohesive group.

Pair light hardwood flooring with a warm colour scheme

If you have a small room that needs to be opened up a bit more, you can do this with a warm colour scheme. Light wood like light oak flooring can be paired with hues of yellow, orange and red to create a warm and bright room. Add mirrors and seamless flooring to create a cohesive and open space that complements your home. If you add dark colours to a small room it can often make the room feel even smaller than before. This works particularly well in kitchens, spaces that typically feel cold due to lots of hard surfaces. Choose contemporary cabinet choices, streamlined hardware and lighting.

Mix wood tones between floors and furniture

You don’t need to match your wood flooring to other pieces of furniture in the room. A modern approach will mix and match different finishes of wood throughout. If you blend rough and rustic with stained and polished in various finishes and grains, it will create a look that suggests the room has been cultivated over time. If possible, try to mix wood floors and furnishes with similar undertones, such as red or grey.

Use texture to balance wood floors

Due to the firmness and the weight of hardwood flooring, it can be quite heavy without softer furnishings. Soften this up with fabrics and area rugs. The hard surface of the solid wood floor can be contrasted by soft fabrics of sheepskin or lambswool that add softness and incorporate airy textures in the form of window treatments and cotton sheets. Add even more layers with glass lamps and metallic light fixtures.

Choose the right type of hardwood flooring

If you’re hoping to transform your home with hardwood flooring, find the best possible options available. It’s important to find an experienced company that have a wide variety of options in order to make your home look its best. A specialist wood flooring company will help you to decide on the best type of wood to use in your home.

Some types of wood you may choose to include are:

  • Ash
  • Beech
  • Cherry
  • Jarrah
  • Jatoba
  • Maple
  • Merbau
  • Oak
  • Walnut

Just Wood Flooring: Hardwood flooring specialists in Sussex

If you’re looking for beautiful hardwood flooring for your home, look no further than Just Wood Flooring. We’re a Southern based company providing flooring, resanding and renovation to add stunning dimension to any room. Our team has decades of experience transforming homes with solid wood flooring. We offer a great range of wood options, so we’re certain we’ll have the right flooring for you.

If you’re looking to renovate your existing flooring, we pride ourselves in returning wood back to its former glory, putting time, care and effort into every job we do. For more information, visit our website or call us on 01243 827888. Our team will be more than happy to help.