How to match this floor with a lighter one?
by
Natasha
+18
We moved to this house with a dark hardwood flooring. Now we'd like to switch the rest of the tile flooring to also wood. However I don't like dark colors and I don't wanna remove the dark ones that are already in the house. I'm looking for a way to match the new light color with this dark one.
Our walls are all gray tones.
I think the easiest thing to do would be to take up the dark flooring, then redo it all with lighter wood. How can you change the dark color to light? Sanding it down may work, then you have to stain it and hope it matches.
Hi Natasha, When we added our addition, we had the same issue. I had lighter oak hardwood flooring in one room but still wanted dark hardwood floors in another room. We definitely were able to do it. I think it looks great because we chose darker hardwood floors that had grains of the lighter wood to match. I took this pic for someone else in the forum to show the wainscoting but the floors are in the pic also. Check out how the darker multicolored hardwood floor ties in with the lighter oak. I think trying to match match the exact type would have been a mistake because it would never have been the same. I know it is a tiny section of this pic to show what I mean so hope you can see it. If you want a bigger pic, let me know...I will take another one for you. Here is the pic:
It can't be determined from the photo you posted, but it appears not to be solid hardwood.
What type of flooring is it - engineered, or laminate?
I think you could go much lighter - just make sure that there is a tone in the new floor that matches the dark one. It should look great!
WOW! Just the issue I am facing. A leak in a section of the wood but cannot get the 12x12 wood sections that show several woodgrains and what to do ---I would love a bigger pix. Thanx. Andrea
You could add a lighter wood in the next room and put some kind of decorative trim in between the two to make them blend. The only way to lighten up this floor would be to sand and restain. That's a big job and a big expense. If a large area rug would fit over the darker wood you could mitigate it with that.
If you want to lighten the dark wood, you would need to either sand it or strip it with a stripper that removes stain (not all do) then if the wood still retains darkness you bleach it out with wood bleach, then mop off residue. Once dry you can finish with stain or just us a water based non-yellowing top coat on the raw wood.
There are flooring companies who have huge sanders with vacuum attachments. They can sand down the floors for you and stain to the color of your choice. You can have them match whatever colors you need.. M friend did this throughout her entire house and it looks great.
Get the floors with the diffrent colors like it’s all diffrent woods on the same floor I have it it’s so pretty and it goes with dark floors and light floors it has light pieces of wood and dark pieces of wood and med colors pieces of wood inverted all over
What kind of floor is that ?
The best way to know is to get samples of new flooring and set it next to the old flooring then pick which you feel is best.
Flooring store will for sure show you your option .. You are already pretty close
Shlutter system could help or nice saddle ..threshold... pIcture is not telling the story
We have matched lots of dark floors to lighter ones. Here's a dark and light floor project in Malibu, LA where they had dark stained (almost black) wood stairs like yours and we sanded and refinished the oak floors to their original light natural color. Turned out really nice.