Is laminate floor out of date ?

I have been married for 42 years and lived in several different houses. I have always painted rooms magnolia as its clean and doesn't date. If paint gets scuffed with the back of a chair I just dab on more, which takes a minute only - easy - and still looks clean. You can introduce colour with cushions/curtains/blinds which I often change to keep it interesting. I also have laminate flooring instead of carpet downstairs because we have always had dogs and you can just wipe clean - easy

We inherited terracotta tiles which we couldn't afford to replace. They were cold underfoot and 9 years later we replaced them with Karndean wood effect which is laid in strips to resemble real wood. It has proved to be the best decision we ever made. The floor looks wonderful as we had a wide range of colours to choose from and made the right decision. It is warm underfoot and doesn't show the dirt. Cleaning is easy too.

We have 'Karndean' on the ground floor and it is excellent - warm underfoot, very attractive, and a real boon with a dog and cat (eight muddy paws!) about the house.

We have Karen in the conservatory. We were assured that it was suitable, but it has faded, an the bits under the chairs now look grubby. It looked lovely when new, just be careful which rooms you use it in!
We have 2 little dogs, so chose engineered wood for the lounge - not a goodchoice as it turns out. We one of the dogs was ill she was sick and wee'd a couple of times. As we were out / in bed at the time and it wasn't cleaned immediately, the floor now has dark stains in a few places. I wish we had gone for a good quality laminate.

What Karen?

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As I am permanently in a wheelchair we cannot have rugs [they ruck up if I drive over them!] and carpets would have been difficult as our drive is gravel [and plant debris/shedded leaves after a rain storm] which gets caught in the wheel treads and brought into the house.

We have bamboo floors, because it is sustainable. It has been down for almost 5 years and looks just as good as when it was first laid.

Dh insisted on tiles in the kitchen. Four are damaged by dh dropping heavy things [three pans, one hammer] onto them, others are cracked, and I hate the way they look, but he "loathes lino" [his mother's choice, in her house. It was worn, but had been down for about 50 years when she passed on!].

Ceramic tiles look nice and are easy to clean but I would recommend under floor heating as they can feel cold in winter.

I've washed my laminate flooring many many times why do you think it can't be washed? Teddy123

Ours has never suffered any ill effects from regular washing.

In our previous house we had some oak Wonderwoods (I think it was called) vinyl flooring put down in our hallway. Warmer than tiles, not noisy like laminate - wheelchair user in house so mucky wheels coming in! It was quite expensive but worth it as it was hard wearing and looked amazing - like real wood boards and people couldn't believe it wasn't the real thing. I'd love it again but we have too many variants of wood here already and one more would do my head in! I have had a tile effect vinyl laid instead.

My daughter has laminate in every room of her flat and it has worn really well and looks lovely. She had some that looks like ;arge square tiles and some that looks like floor boards. She has white floor boards in the bedroom which looks very classy. If you buy laminate that is too cheap it looks cheap but the more expensive one have grain and look like wood.

Thanks Shanma
Have huge cump of rosemary in the garden and shall try it on my kitchen floor

I'm glad you said that Antonia as I was keeping my head down! I hate it too. Both my children have laminate in their houses and I find it so cold and hard and echoey. When they ring up I hear the echo on the phone. It's also very noisy walking on it. I think it's still fashionable, but personally I prefer the warmth and comfort of carpets.

It's interesting that people find laminate flooring noisy. If you have a good acoustic underlay underneath it, it should not be noisy. Neither should it be particularly cold. Good quality laminate is tough too. We've had a heavy piano moved on ours three times and it hasn't marked the floor at all.

I was a bit perplexed about the 'noise' factor too as I don't find it at all noisy. We don't wear hard shoes in the house anyway but it isn't at all noisy. Maybe in apartments it would be different.

One of my daughters has a floor similar to laminate but it is actually engineered wood, with a thick veneer of oak and a very durable seal on top. It is laid like laminate, with sheets of 3 planks clicking together in situ, and has a slightly matte finish so doesn't show marks.

She's had it down for around 18 months now in hall and living room and so far it shows no signs of wear at all. One of my sons has a laminate floor and it doesn't look nearly as good and has not worn so well.

We bought it on special offer with an additional discount from Homebase when the range was being discontinued, so it ended up costing only slightly more than laminate. Could I suggest that you look around at products like this in the DIY warehouses and grab an offer when it appears? For the small additional cost you get a much better looking floor which wears better.

I should add that I agree with the comments about using a proper underlay, both on a draughty floor with a void and on a solid floor. It makes the world of difference to both heat and noise.

I have replaced the old laminate I inherited when I moved in here with non slip vinyl, looks like wood and is so easy to clean and non slip, which is essential for me now.

I have a mop with a water tank on it (not steam) but it makes life so much easier, no bucket to fill or empty.

I have no dread of visiting GC or the dog now.........in fact dirt hardly shows on it...........bliss

Our hall and kitchen floors are tiled. Looks great, easy to keep clean but feels cold to the feet. If you never go barefoot that's not a problem, and in summer it's nice and cool. We went to a specialist tile merchant and it cost about the same as laminate. We have had laminate before but it began to come up (glue gave up)after we had the occasional mishap in the kitchen.

We had laminate throughout the ground floor in this house when we moved in. Great Plumbing Disaster of 2010 meant that kitchen, hall, living room and downstairs loo all needed replacing. Now we have carpet in living room and ceramic tiles in hall, kitchen and loo. We have a long Persian runner which we put down in the hall in winter. Much better arrangement, still have some laminate in dining room and conservatory but its days are numbered!

We used an emulsion paint called Timeless to update magnolia walls. Looks much brighter now.

I originally had Quickstep laminate flooring in our kitchen/diner but was never that keen on it. Then we replaced it with Karndean and can recommend this above anything (apart from solid oak flooring which is definitely out of our price range!).
If you go to the head office of Karndean flooring with your measurements they will give you a virtual room design with so many options, you'll really be able to see what your room will look like.

Engineered wood is the 'in' thing at the moment.

We've got some laminate (which was a good make) which has worn well and some real (expensive!) wood in the conservatory which in fact has not worn so well and only 3 years old.