Wood Floor Staining

The wood floor staining is a part of the floor restoration process and it gives you the opportunity to completely change the colour of your wooden floors. Staining may perfectly suit a new home renovation or interior design changes.

With our wood floor staining service you can achieve almost any colour you may desire with the help of the finest products on the market from companies like Osmo, Morrells and Ciranova. They can turn your Nordic light floor into a dark walnut or the other way round, depending on how you like it.

Each Timber Type Is Unique

Staining, as far as mechanics go, is fairly easy. Sand, apply stain, remove excess stain and let it dry. It’s really not rocket science. The trick is, that the job has to be done fast and you cannot stop halfway down the road. If for some reason you made a mistake, you have to sand again to remove the stain and start all over. This is annoying but bearable. The truly hard part is the so called 'colour matching'. Some people think that they can just select a stain from a catalogue and once the flooring expert is done, they can enjoy the result which will absolutely the same as the sample. Not true. Many factors affect the way the stain looks. First, it is wood type. The original colour of the wood will certainly change the overall appearance of the surface. Imagine that you want a grey stained floor. They are so popular today? Using it on a white oak will be great idea since it will blend pretty well with the original colour. Try it on a pine with its yellow and red tones and you will have much less impressive results. The general rule is that the original colour of the wood will influence the tints but this is more visible on lightly stained floors.

Pine floor boards are where most work applies due to the fact that it is the most wood stain friendly timber. Because of its grain similarity with some other species, pine easily resembles walnut, oak and teak after the stain application. Maple in particular, doesn’t absorb stains very well because it is a close pored tree. Regardless of the colour the results are simply not as appealing as on other types of wood.

Can You Stain Without Sanding?

Do you know why we always sand before staining? The stain is liquid coloured with a pigment. When applied on a wooden surface it soaks in it and exaggerates the grain. Any parts of the floor which haven’t been sanded properly will become much more visible. If sections of your finish have worn off, the damaged area will stick out. For this reason, before applying a stain, you must first remove the worn finish, stain and seal it again with a water based polyurethane lacquer which doesn’t turn yellow over time as much as its oil-based counterpart.

The answer to this question is no, you cannot apply a stain and expect the floor to look good without sanding. However, there is another option. On the market you can find lacquers which come with their very own colour. Essentially, they work in the same way as more traditional varnishes while also fulfilling the functions of a stain. The only difference is that you may need additional coating to cover more uneven areas. Of course, this only works on slightly damaged surfaces. For a very distressed and uneven floor you need to sand, it is the only proper way.

The process of applying wood stains is performed with a roller by hand and it takes an average of 8-9 hours to dry, but it is highly recommended to leave the floor overnight to dry.

The following stains are available in our vans at all times:

• Morrells LF Wood Stains: antique pine, antique yew, light oak, medium oak, dark oak, teak, walnut, rosewood, natural mahogany, jacobean oak and black;
• Bona Create Range: Ice, Stone and Coal
• Osmo Transperant Colours: Oak Antique, Walnut, Ebony, and White.