This is 3/4″ Hardwood Maple Flooring I’m using for a job in progress. I like the fact that I can actually see the tree in these boards. The dark area is called “heart wood.” Usually, Hard Maple Strip flooring is sold with the heart wood cut out of it, and all you see is the light part or what some people call “sap wood.” I’ve seen strip flooring with a mix of light, dark and a few knots called Tavern Grade, sold in stores. Since my house is in the mountains and surrounded by forest, I decided the tree look was appropriate. Finished photos are at the end of this post.
This is not an easy project. It is very time consuming and in the end I don’t know how much money you would save. I could have bought hardwood strip flooring off the shelf for around $5/sq. ft. and done this same job in 2 days. But I went another route, and when it was all said and done, this job will take over 2 weeks of my time. The motivation has to be something more than cost, I think: You have to be in love with the idea of taking trees from your land and making them into flooring. I really don’t expect anyone will take on this project. But if you do, I would love to hear from you.