What's the Process for Selecting a Wood Finish?

Getting new wood floors or old floors refinished is so exciting. The material is so warm and it can completely change the feel of a space. However, if you’ve never been through the process it can be a bit nerve-wracking. It’s a huge investment and it’s a lot of material that’s going to have the same stain for a LONG time, but luckily most installers follow roughly the same process and selecting a stain is something that’s usually done onsite in the context of your home.

One Stain Does Not Fit All
Wood stain is not like paint. Every stain is going to look different depending on the species of wood. So although it’s a good to have a general idea of what you’d like the stain to look like (white-wash, light, mid-toned, dark), you’ll need to make the finish decision onsite once the flooring professional is finished installing your new floors or prepping your existing floors.

If Your Wood Floors Are Being Refinished
Your refinisher will sand all the floors down, which is pretty amazing to watch. They are usually super focused and meticulous because there’s only so many times you can sand down a wood floor to refinish it. In some instances, the wood is so thin, that they would need to install new wood flooring altogether if you’d like a different color.

The process gets messy, there’s a lot of dust and fumes so most have equipment solutions for dealing with dust and ventilation. However, still expect that there will still be dust nonetheless—the dust is so fine, it’s tough to catch all of it. After the floors are sanded down, they’ll apply a few stain samples to one section of floor for your review.

Here is a real-life example of picking a stain from our Moody Historic Townhouse Project. As you can see, the stain took to the wood differently in each section. Having your contractor apply your options directly to the wood lets you see how each stain will take to your specific floors.

If You’re Getting Wood Floors Installed in One Room to Match the Rest of the Wood Flooring in the House

The process is very similar, except they feather in new wood flooring into the existing wood flooring. This means that if the planks are running in the same direction from one room to another, the new flooring is laid in so that the planks all look like they’ve always been one cohesive floor. If you just cut a straight line between new and old wood planks going in the same direction, there will be a very clear seam and it’ll be a clear mistake. You want all the planks to be offset, as if it was installed all at one time.

The new flooring should be the same species and plank width of the existing flooring so they end up matching as closely as possible. Most floor installers and refinishers can tell you the wood species just by looking at it. On our Timeless Achromatic project, new wood flooring was installed in the kitchen and it was finished to match the wood flooring in the living areas. They did an amazing job!