Don’t let your kitchen ‘floor’ you when it comes to upgrading

One the easiest and hardest rooms to upgrade flooring in is the kitchen. It needs something special.

You spend so much time in the kitchen that you want it to look good. Maybe you even entertain in there, or the kids love it and the all congregate there after school. Whatever the reason you want a new look for your kitchen, there are a whole slew of options out there. It won’t take long to find precisely what you need to make the heart of the home look spectacular. Just remember, you want it to be durable, classy and look like a million bucks.

For heavy traffic, stone or tile is just about the perfect solution. Stone would be your first choice if you want a natural look in your home. Start with the kitchen and then work your way through the rest of the house. It’s a bit like eating popcorn —- once you start upgrading flooring, love how it looks and endures, you want more. You might want to consider slate, limestone or even sandstone. These are the current trending natural floorings and you can choose a rougher look or one that is slightly more polished.

Not into stone? Then you may like the smooth, glossy and sleek finish of porcelain. Although, if you do have kids and they drop things a lot, this might not be a good option for you. However, if your kids are older and don’t drop glasses anymore, porcelain could be a crowd pleaser. And here’s another tip: you can use porcelain tiles to make the floor look like stone, but spend fewer bucks on the deal. While they are smoother than stone, they have a wider variety of patterns, designs and colors. Coming into its own these days is metallic finish tiles. Quite eye-catching indeed.

If porcelain or stone don’t appeal to you, you could always think about concrete flooring. While that may sound really odd, and more like something one would find in a mall, concrete flooring is being installed in many newer homes. This is because it holds heat well and if you’re worried about longevity, this stuff lasts for decades.

Don’t think for a minute that it just lays there and looks like concrete, the stuff outside we use for sidewalks. It can be tricked out in ways you would not believe, like acid stained, polished, colored or honed. And believe it or not, it can be used for countertops, as well.

You could also select woods such as oak, bamboo or laminates, or go modern with glass and resin. No matter what look you want, you will find it out there.