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3 1/4" Honey stained Red Oak

This floor is Appalachian 3 1/4" Honey stained prefinished Red Oak. The floor portion of this install was fairly straightforward. It did involve some custom transions and headers for transitions from the new hardwood to the tile and carpet. For the stairs, I stained 1/4" oak plywood to match the floor and cut it to fit for the stringers (the sides of the steps). Then I built custom square stair nosings out of the flooring with the front corner chamfered to soften it. The bottom two steps required some extra trimming of the rough framing to make them square. Notice how this extra care helps to make the stairs symetrical and make the angled lines consistent and staight. During the entire job, all cutting possible was done in the garage to minimize the dust in the house. Below is a copy of the reference letter that the homeowner emailed me just hours after completing the install.

April 21, 2011

Letter of Recommendation

Dave, I want to thank you for the masterful workmanship you did on my floors.
My home is 20 years old and prior to hiring you I had searched the market to try to match the wood doors and trim with new flooring, but to no avail. However, when I received your quote you sent me to your wood supplier and I found a very close match. Impressively, the same supplier made a comment to a friend I recommended to you “Mr. Cobbs father is a master in the industry and if Dave is anything like his father he is a master in his trade.” What a fine compliment to you.

First impressions are extremely important. You impressed me with your manner, knowledge of Canadian wood and very reasonable quote compared to other local well-known suppliers.

You certainly educated me to have an much better appreciation for the type and nature of market wood. I was also impressed that you finished the project in 3 ½ days. You were consistently punctual every day at 7am and had respect for my home.

Dave your workmanship is truly superior. The floors look remarkable and have transformed my home, blending the old with the new.

I will highly recommend you to all I know.

Thank you again Dave. It’s been great working with you.

All the best,

Colleen W.
Calgary AB

Dark Walnut Laminate Floor

This is a dark walnute colored laminate floor I just installed. It is a straightforward layout without too much to cut around. What finishes it off nicely and ties the whole space together is the use of the laminate to wrap the toekicks around the base of cabinets. This is a great way to finish the floor off especially when the cabinets are existing and matching material may not be readily available.

Prefinished Maple Stairs

This is a set of custom made prefinished maple stairs. For these stairs I custom made nosings out of the flooring itself to give a square, modern profile rather than the traditional bullnose look. The treads and risers were both installed using the flooring to give a 100% uniform appearance.

Prefinished maple inset

This is a prefinished maple inset. It was built to follow the dimensions and angles of the entry way of this house. It is slightly unorthodox to have a hardwood "area mat" in a front entrance, but the homeowner specifically requested it to have the front of the house tie in with a formal living room that had hardwood at the back of the house. Around the inset was later filled with tile by another contractor.

Dark walnut stained oak stairs

These stairs were built with nosings that I custom made out of the flooring. They are done open ended with return ends. The risers were done with mdf painted to match the wainscotting and existing stair railing. These stairs were particularily difficult due to each tread having two railing spindles on them to install around.

PREFINISHED AMERICAN WALNUT

These are some prefinished black walnut stairs. For these stairs, I custom built nosings and stained and finished walnut plywood for the risers and stringers. I also supplied raw walnut stock which I shaped, stained and finished to match the flooring to build custom stringer capping from. I also installed the baseboards on the winder treads after to complete the job.


This is the bottom half of the set of walnut stairs. Here you can better see the profile of the custom built nosings as well as the walnut plywood risers. Also you can see how nicely the custom made stringer capping finishes off the sides of the steps.

This is a #1 American or Black Walnut. In this grade it has a very nice variance of light and dark wood. With a higher select grade it would be more consistently dark brown. As attractive as it is, walnut is not a practical choice for flooring for most people. This is due to it being very soft. It rates at almost 30% softer than standard red oak.