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Archive for the ‘Interior Design’ Category
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Thursday, August 20th, 2009At Home Shopping
Thursday, August 20th, 2009Book an appointment and we come to you. Let our top design staff help you design a flooring solution with you in your home. Click for details.
Marble Tile Flooring: A Beautiful Tradition
Thursday, August 20th, 2009The use of marble for flooring is as old as flooring itself. From the buildings of ancient Greece to modern statues and monuments, the beautiful stone has a place in everything. But marble tile flooring can be very expensive and has a smooth, cold texture that can be a real downside in a bathroom. Additionally, it is difficult and expensive to install. With the new bathroom ceramic tiles available on the market now, does going marble really make sense?
Bathroom Ceramic Tiles
There was a time when marble was the only choice for a sophisticated bathroom. But that was when tiles were limited to glass rather than the wide range of ceramic and porcelain tiles that exist today. Modern tiles can easily rival marble tile flooring in efficiency and beauty, and the average ceramic tile is much less expensive than its marble counterpart.
Bathroom ceramic tiles are designed for durability and elegance. They are tremendously versatile and their lower cost allows you more freedom to use them in novel ways. Tiles also tend to offer a better grip than a highly polished marble surface, helping to prevent slipping after bathing or showering.
If you are really set on the marble look, you can achieve that same elegant appeal with less cost by using the marble as an accent piece. Try using a granite or marble countertop instead of re-doing the entire bathroom floor in marble. There are excellent ceramic tiles to coordinate with almost any countertop shade you could pick; why spend the money to put marble down all over the bathroom?
Of course, there are some situations where marble – and only marble – will do the job. If you have your mind truly made up, make sure that your marble supplier is responsible and willing to work with you. Some marble installers can be resistant to your questions and ideas, installing your floor the way they want to with little or no input from you. A good company will be happy to answer your questions and help you get the bathroom you really want.
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Bathroom Floor Tiles As Design Statements
Thursday, August 20th, 2009Strange though it may seem, one of the first things your guests will see is your bathroom. Even if you entertain casually and never have much traffic outside the living or dining room, your friends will still need to see the restroom. Consequently, that seemingly unimportant powder room should receive just as much care and attention as the often-improved entrance hall.
But despite this crucial role, many bathrooms remain in the design dark ages. Most are covered with dated and worn bathroom floor tiles, relics of a bygone era rather than shining beacons of modern style. Toilets and plumbing fixtures are often tarnished and loose. Some full baths have remarkably dirty and mildewed showers. No matter how nice your foyer might look, no guest will be thinking of the entry hall when they enter a bad bathroom!
Luckily, today’s tile market offers many different options to help you get the ceramic mosaic tiles your bathroom deserves. These tiles provide an incredible variety of design options, everything from standard stone-finish flooring to intricate inlays. With the right company, you can go from design concept to installation quickly and efficiently. Even better, ceramic mosaic tiles are less expensive than stone and much more pleasant to walk on: where stone can sometimes grow chilly, ceramic mosaic tiles stay much more reliably at room temperature.
Ceramic Mosaic Tiles
Without a doubt, tiles are an excellent option for giving your bathroom a vibrant new look. But don’t just think of them as bathroom floor tiles; good ceramic is much more versatile. Here are just a few ways you can use a seemingly common tile to give your bathroom unexpected flair:
- Create a pattern on the floor.
- Vary the size of the tile while keeping the color constant.
- Incorporate a tile accent.
- Install tile on your walls or counters as well.
- Design your own wall art to highlight a sink or architectural feature.
With so many options, ceramic tile is the clear choice for the bathroom and beyond. Check out Travertine stone tile.
Parquet Wood Flooring
Thursday, August 20th, 2009
Parquet has a long history, dating back to the magnificent French palaces of the 17th century. But the beautiful geometric patterns, usually quite intricate, have found a place in the finest wide plank flooring and accents of today. Parquet wood flooring is excellent for adding a focal point to a room, or for creating a “room within a room” – a small space outlined with a beautiful, contrasting wood pattern in the floor which divides the space without enclosing it. Parquet provides a particularly lovely contrast when paired with warm and stately reclaimed wood floors.
So, what is parquet? Simply put, parquet is the art of wooden inlays. Parquet is typically very intricate and very elegant, requiring many hours to plan and carve. In the early days, each different parquet piece was hand-carved and assembled to ensure that it would match perfectly. Because the parquet is made entirely from wood there can be no irregularities in fit as there could be in stone floors: if two pieces of parquet are not perfectly sized they will have to be re-made.
Wide Plank Flooring And Parquet
In modern use, entire floors are rarely done in parquet. It is far more common to find parquet flooring used as an accent piece, such as a medallion set in the middle of a room and surrounded by wide plank flooring. The elegant, rich tones of the flooring provide a canvas for the parquet, allowing it to stand out and make a beautiful impression. Parquet often coordinates with any wooden furniture in the room, either contrasting with it or highlighting it to really make it pop.
Reclaimed Wood Floors: The Final Touch
Although parquet wood flooring looks beautiful with any type of wooden floor, many homeowners like to pair it with beautiful and ecologically sensitive reclaimed wood floors. These floors recycle wood from old homes and reuse it, saving trees to protect the environment while providing a lovely classic feel for your home. Parquet inlays fit right in with the rich colors of reclaimed wood and are an excellent finishing touch to any room.
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Classic Designs In Contemporary Area Rugs
Thursday, August 20th, 2009
Karastan area rugs have a simple theory behind them: the old patterns of beautiful rugs from days gone by are still beautiful, and still add sophistication to homes now just as they did in ancient times. The Karastan company conducts extensive research into traditional rug patterns from all of antiquity, ranging from weaving patterns seen on cave drawings to samples preserved in museums.
Of course, Karastan also considers the patterns found on rugs made in India, China, and throughout the world. Many tribes still practice their traditional weaving patterns, creating breathtaking works of art. Those rugs are then made into contemporary area rugs by Karastan to bring that touch of traditional beauty into your home.
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Karastan Area Rugs: Standards And Quality
Karastan has been making quality area rugs since 1928, when Marshall Field noted that the loom technology of the day had come to rival expensive, handmade rugs in quality and design. He founded Karastan area rugs, which came to be the standard known throughout the industry. Karastan rugs come in a variety of colors and designs, but they are far more durable than their hand-woven counterparts. While most contemporary area rugs need to be hand-cleaned and rarely recover if something is spilled on them, Karastan rugs can be cleaned so easily and with such good results that industry experts are amazed.
In 1933, Karastan set up a rug at the World’s Fair in Chicago. But they didn’t just let people see the rug. They invited every single person at the Fair to walk over it. By the time the rug was taken up, more than 5 million people had left their mark on the rug. Covered with every type of filth from food stains to dust to wear and tear, the rug was almost unrecognizable. Karastan then did a test: they washed one side of the rug, while leaving the other side untouched and dirty. When the cleaning was finished, the washed side was as good as new.