Choosing A Carpet Depending On The Room

Some areas of the home need more attention to the flooring than others. With certain rooms being used more often than others, it goes without saying that a harder wearing carpet or flooring will be required in the busier areas of a home. In comparison, another less used room in the home could benefit from an expensive good looking carpet, if you know it will be enjoyed more rarely and will therefore last longer. But what's the most suitable flooring depending on the room?

We're looking exclusively at carpet, and we'll start at the most traditionally anti-carpet room in the house; the bathroom.

Here it's frequently assumed that carpet isn't suitable for the bathroom, with the risk of water ever threatening. The only time you'd ever want to avoid using carpet in a bathroom is if it's likely to be continually drenched, perhaps where you might have young children and the risk is that little bit higher. However, a synthetic carpet is completely ideal for the bathroom, being hard wearing and durable, able to be resistant for those times that it will inevitable come into contact with water.

Onto the busier areas of the house, where carpet is a much more frequent sight; from the living room, the hallways, the stairs and the landing, hard wearing carpet is a must in all of these places. A carpet with 80% wool content or more is ideal, and look for a carpet which has a Quality Mark in the Heavy or Extra Heavy Domestic area. This way you'll have a carpet in the busiest areas of the home which is up to the task when it comes to being used regularly day in, day out.

However, take a look at a room which is used much less regularly, somewhere where perhaps a lot of pride is taken into ensuring it's always well kept. A dining room is a perfect example, where it's perhaps used only once or twice a day at most, where a carpet can be as unique as you like. Here you can be safe in the knowledge that a carpet used only once or twice a day will last for a significantly longer time than a carpet placed in the hallway, so be indulgent and splash out. Take a carpet with a unique design and make the room look great. While a patterned or silky carpet might be less durable, with the room being used much less often, it's worth the investment.

Plain Carpet Versus Patterned Carpet

With buying a carpet, you've got a lot to think about. Whether it's the huge range of price, the quality of carpet to choose, or whether it comes down to picking a carpet brand or carpet style. However additionally, you've also got the important decision to make of how the carpet will physically look. Plain carpets are a common sight throughout a home, but a patterned carpet makes an appearance just as often, in fact perhaps more often than you might expect. Next time you're round the home of a friend or family, take a look at the carpet they use; it's likely that a few of their carpets will be patterned as opposed to plain.

But why choose one or the other?

Plain carpet is the traditional and safe option. The colour can be easily chosen to match the room, and a plain carpet is timeless; it won't ever go out of style, while a patterned carpet might. The fact that the design is completely plain makes it a popular choice in the majority of homes, meaning that wallpaper and furniture is easy to match to the colour. What's more, a plain carpet can make the room look larger, expanding the depth of the room, which with an expensive looking carpet can really make the room stand out.

Patterned carpet on the other hand has its own benefits too. A patterned carpet doesn't have to mean out-of-fashion 60s or 70s floral type patterning, in fact the majority of patterned carpets are quite the opposite. With modern designs, whether it be simple stripes or a colourful design meant to stand out from the background, most designs these days are quite fashionable and desirable. Stripes and swirls will hold their own for years to come, whereas a more modern artsy design might not last so long; make sure when you're buying a new carpet to bear this in mind. While a patterned carpet might look great today, in ten years time it might feel dated and completely unwanted, warranting a very quick replacement.

The Different Styles Of Carpet

When buying a carpet, one of the areas to look at is the style of carpet you're looking to buy. Along with colour, style is a hugely important area which needs great care and thought before making your final decision. Generally speaking, the more luxurious the style of carpet, the more attention the floor will need to keep it looking at its best. Therefore choosing the best style for the situation is of great importance. Short pile carpet will generally last longer than a longer pile carpet, but it can all rest on personal taste.

There's a large selection of carpet styles available, which all have a unique look and feel, and additionally have different lifespans depending on the quality and pile of carpet. The most commonly seen carpet styles are as follows:

Twist Pile
A rugged and coarsely finished carpet, very durable but tough under foot.

Velvet Pile
Similar to a suede material, a velvet pile has a silky luxurious look.

Loop Pile
A loop pile carpet is an attempt to replicate the look and feel of a natural floor such as sisal. With the looped carpet, if you've got pets, this sort of carpet is not recommended due to the temptation of clawing.

Saxony
A deep pile carpet which is extremely soft under the foot, and has great depth, making it ideal for a bedroom or lesser used area.

Patterned
Similar to Velvet Pile carpet, a patterned carpet will be smooth and shiny, to allow for sharp detail.

Why Wool Carpet Is Safer

The Benefits Of Wool Carpet

The more expensive flooring option, but a carpet with 80% or more wool, is the more intelligent option. From the immediately obvious improvement in terms of look and feel of the carpet, to saving you money in the long run with durability and resilience, a wool carpet is the preferred choice of professionals. In comparison to more synthetic carpets, there is simply no comparison.

But it doesn't stop at the look and feel of the carpet, or indeed at the long-term money saving, there's safety benefits too. Whether thinking about younger children, or the elderly - or generally looking at safety in the house on a day to day basis, you might not realise it, but a wool carpet has significant benefits when it comes to being safe around the home.

If you're interested in having wool carpet in your home, you need to look around to make sure the carpet you're getting is genuine wool, and that the percentage of wool is above 80% in the carpet to ensure a high quality. Cheaper retailers might only stock mostly synthetic carpet, where the wool percentage is very low, so perhaps visit an independent flooring retailer, or try to buy carpet online instead.

Fire Safety

Wool is naturally fire retardant.

Firstly, and definitely most importantly, comes the fact that wool carpet is naturally fire retardant. This means when coming to fitting to carpet in, for example, the living room, where perhaps you might have an open fire going on cold or wintry nights, it's perfectly safe. No worries for if a spark fires off into the room and lands on the carpet, your wool is safe. In comparison, a synthetic fire when met with a spark could easily be set alight, which if you're not properly prepared, could spell disaster.

Therefore you've no problem with other similar fire problems either - perhaps you've got no electricity for a while and you resort to candles for lighting. If one ends up falling onto the floor, again no problem, the wool won't catch light. Same with cigarettes, or anything which with a synthetic floor, would catch fire.

General Safety 

Soft and forgiving

With a more synthetic and artificial flooring surface, it's more prone to being slipped upon, which with young children is a likely happening, while with the elderly it can be quite dangerous. The material can tend to be a more shiny surface, and can generally be a lot more solid too. While wool is soft under the foot, synthetic carpet tends to be tough and hard.

What this all means then, is that wool is the obvious choice to make in almost any environment. When it comes to dropping something on the floor, a glass for example would normally smash on a harder more synthetic carpet, while if falling on wool, the result is quite different. Instead, wool is fluffy and soft, cushioning the fall. While the glass might still break, it's significantly more likely to remain unharmed.

The same then goes for you and your family too. Rushing from one room to another might be a dangerous act with a mostly synthetic floor, while with a woolen carpet it's no problem at all. Wool has a high slip resistance, reducing the likelihood of slipping or dropping anything in the first place. Then what's more, because of the cushioning effect, injury is much less likely, as your fall becomes much softer.

For the elderly or in a house where children are about, wool carpet is the much better choice for safety then. Where items might be dropped, or where people might have a fall, the slip resistance and cushioning of wool is a great benefit.

Why You Should Buy A Wool Rich Carpet

When buying a new carpet, you have the immediate choice of buying either a carpet with a high percentage of wool, or something more synthetic. There are advantages and disadvantages of both, but a carpet with at least 80% wool is the type of carpet preferred by those in the industry, for a number of very good reasons.

Firstly, in terms of being a long term investment, with a wool carpet having a much longer lifespan than synthetic carpet, it's the more sensible option to buy. Although it will cost a bit more initially, in the long run it's the more cost effective option. Therefore a wool carpet can be fitted to the busiest room of the house, and still remain in great condition for years to come. It looks better overall, feels great under your feet, and lasts longer - what's not to like?

Wool carpet is the more luxurious option too. When walking barefoot over a wool carpet, you immediately can tell it's wool, just by the feeling of quality under the foot. A synthetic carpet in comparison will feel as if it's made of wire and looks significantly less impressive. For a large room, you're better off buying wool, if only for the looks alone.

It's not only look and feel which makes wool the better option either. In terms of keeping the room warm, you can't get better than a wool carpet. Wool is a great insulator, allowing for loss of heat through the floor to be hugely minimised, and as a result, your room stays warm. In comparison, synthetic carpets are generally poor insulators, meaning not only do you miss out with the look and feel of a great carpet, but you lose the money saving advantage of decent insulation too.

Avoid These Mistakes When Buying Carpet

When buying carpet, depending on the size of the room and the quality of carpet you're buying, there can often be a lot of money involved. Therefore you want things to go smoothly, and won't be able to afford having things go wrong, on any level. From start to finish, from ordering the carpet to having it fitted, there's a number of areas where buying a carpet can often go wrong. While most flooring retailers are perfectly fine, others can trip up and make mistakes more often than not - but there's a few simple ways in which to avoid these mistakes happening to you.

Too Good To Be True Prices
A simple one, which applies to nearly everything you buy - if the price looks too good to be true, it probably is, even more so if you buy carpet online. Take a look at comparative prices for similar carpet from other retailers. Generally prices will be about the same from retailer to retailer for the carpet, so if something looks particularly cheap, there's a reason for it - don't go there.

Have a Quote in Writing
Before ordering, make sure to get a written quote explaining the size of carpet to be ordered, and the work to be carried out. Make sure carpet fitting and delivery is included, before you end up with a nasty surprise. Do this especially before leaving a deposit.

Have a Protected Deposit
Pay for your carpet, especially when it's a lot of money involved, by credit card if possible. This way if things fall through, you can claim the money back on their protection schemes. You can also try to use a retailer who has a deposit protection scheme. While things go right 99% of the time, you should make sure to be completely protected if you fall into the 1% of people who have a problem.

Hidden Charges
Check and double check the quote you've been given. Make sure it includes everything - ask them! Make sure you're not only buying the carpet, but that delivery is paid for too, along with carpet fitting. Not only should it include fitting, but it should also provide moving of furniture and removal of old or existing carpet or flooring. You don't want to have a date booked for carpet fitting, only to find the company charges an extortionate amount to move a piece of furniture from the room.

Cancellation Charges
Check about hefty charges for cancelling the order. If something goes wrong between the time you order the carpet and have the fitting booked, you want to be sure that you don't end up paying a huge amount to cancel your order.

What If Something Goes Wrong?
Ensure the retailer will look after things on your behalf. Make sure the company has a procedure for dealing with complaints.

Check Your Rights
Check your rights with the flooring retailer to ensure you are able to ask for a product to be returned if, for example, your carpet is delivered with a defect. If colour is faded, inconsistent or simply wrong, you shouldn't have to keep it. The same applies if the floor is damaged, it should be able to be returned and replaced.

All in all, if you follow the above advice, you will be protected from almost any situation, whatever happens. Whether things fall through on your side, where perhaps a job falls through and you suddenly can't afford the payment - or whether the flooring retailer makes a mistake of their own, you can avoid tripping over on hidden charges, or payments that you shouldn't be making, by following the simple tips above.

 

Ten Carpet Buying Tips

Buying a carpet is a big deal, and a big long term investment. With the amount of money involved, and the fact that once it's fitted, it's there for many years to come, it's vital that you get it right - and first time. It's not only the colour and design of the carpet you need to worry about; cost and especially quality play a part too. You can pay a huge amount for a carpet, especially if you buy carpet online - but if it only lasts a couple of years, it's a very poor investment. Therefore you need to strike a balance between the amount of money you pay in comparison to the quality of carpet. Keeping costs down while maintaining a decent quality of carpet is a difficult task.

Therefore here's a few tips to help you along the way; and make that task less difficult altogether.

Planning

1. Where is the carpet going? If the carpet is fitted in the hallway or the stairs for example, it will receive a lot more wear than if it's fitted in the bedroom or spare room.

2. What are the plans for the room? What are the future plans for decorating in the room? The last thing you want to do is have a carpet fitted, then decide to paint the walls and risk having paint over the floor - If redecorating, choose the carpet first and match the rest of the décor to the floor chosen - But, most importantly, make sure the carpet is the last thing to be installed to the room.

3. Plain, Patterned, Textured, Bordered? Decide between colour and design, you have a large range of choices to make here.

4. Long Term Purchase? How long do you want the carpet to last? If you don't plan on staying long, or intend on moving house, don't splash out on an expensive carpet; a cheap alternative will last you long enough. Alternatively, if you're intending to use the carpet day in day out for many years to come, invest in quality which will last.

5. What's the budget? Remember to include fitting and transport costs, along with underlay and gripper rod - sometimes these aren't included in the price mentioned.

Once you've decided on these first five issues, you're ready to have your carpet ordered, and move on with the process.

Buying

6. Have the room measured. Don't do this yourself. Have the room measured professionally instead. A carpet fitter will know how much space they can save by cutting off areas and ordering an optimal size of carpet. Not all rooms are square, but the roll of carpet has to be cut to fit.

7. Take a carpet sample. The vast majority of carpet retailers will let you take a carpet sample home, allowing you to test for yourself just what the carper might look like once it's on the floor. Don't just settle on the one colour or style either, try a few.

8. Buy New Underlay. The underside of the carpet is just as important as the top. Preserving the underneath of the carpet with brand new underlay will allow your carpet to survive longer. Sometimes a new underlay can provide an additional 40% life in a carpet, so don't ignore it.

9. Have a professional fit the carpet. Check their standards; most carpet retailers and carpet fitters have quality standards. Look for something like the Carpet Foundation logo, to ensure they are trusted, reputable and will do a good job. When the carpet is fitted, make sure to keep any cut off carpet from the job, as you never know when you might need it!

10. Buy the best you can afford. If you've got a budget of £5000, don't spend half of that - a more expensive carpet will have much more quality. With carpet you absolutely get what you pay for. Not only will it last you longer, saving you money in the long run, but you'll notice the difference under your foot too.

Buy Rugs Online

How to: Buying a Rug Online

Something like carpet or wood flooring to buy online is difficult, that's understandable - with the measuring of the room, how much carpet or wood being required differing from job to job, not to mention picking the perfect colour of carpet to match the room, along with arranging delivery, let alone having the carpet or wood actually fitted - probably all around your busy schedule - it's a difficult ask, especially if you're trying to do it all online.

Rugs however, are completely different. Small or large, rugs are still easily delivered by courier companies - and most rug companies already provide online services to buy rugs online without hassle. With a huge choice of rugs to match all sorts of room styles, you don't have to worry so much about the rug not fitting in with the room - and if it doesn't fit one room, it can always be moved to another, unlike the carpet or wood floor. So just how easy is it?

Take Your Pick 

A standard rug, or one of your own?

Buying a rug online is actually a simple task - as simple as buying a DVD or anything else online, you just find the one you want, click order, enter your delivery address, and await for it to arrive!

With most rug companies, they have a huge range of already designed rugs in an array of colours and styles for you to choose from. Likelihood is that you can find a perfect rug from this selection, something which will match your room perfectly and really tie the whole thing together.

Once you've found the style and colour of rug you want, simply specify how large or small you want the rug to be - measure the area of the room to make sure it will fit the space appropriately - and order it online. Just as buying anything else online, there's nothing more to it - just enter your payment and delivery details, and you're all done - it will be delivered to you from stock, just like anything else you order online. Easy!

Or Make Your Own! 

Fancy something more unique?

If you can't quite find the perfect rug for you, you can always go down the bespoke route - many rug companies also provide a custom made rug service, allowing you to specify the design entirely to your liking. Whether you use a completely new design, or one of the rug company's already made designs, it's up to you. From there, choose a variety of colours to suit the rug, and even choose the style of wool used on the rug - whether you want traditional loop pile rug, or a more silky shimmering style - everything is down to you.

A lot of rug manufacturers provide the ability to create your own rug online too - play around with online software to design a rug from your home computer - some software will even allow you to display the rug in a 'lifestyle' situation, allowing you to completely visualise how the rug will look when placed in the room. Then, once you're happy, simply print the design off and bring it into most flooring retailers, who will be happy to convert the design into a full size rug for you!

Just like buying a standard rug online, creating a bespoke rug is just as simple and easy!

Create Your Own Rug

Create Your Own Rug

Let a bespoke rug be the talking point of the room and show off your own unique style and individuality.

It often feels like almost everyone is into interior design these days; keeping your home up to date, fresh and modern, is a tedious but often necessary task.

Something which is often forgotten about, however, is the flooring. We're always happy to splash out on colourful walls and expensive furniture, but the floor is often left as an afterthought. While wood floor might make the room feel homely, or a comfortable carpet might add some warmth to the room, it still lacks some character, that finishing touch, something to tie the room together.

And this is where a bespoke rug can really come into a league of it's own; create your own rug and it really allows you to add something unique to the room. Whether it be the bedroom or the living room, a rug can always manage to tie the room together, and make it feel complete.

Make it Unique 

Don't stop at any old rug, why not go bespoke?

Plenty of places sell rugs if you spend the time to look around; but finding the perfect rug for the room is often a hugely difficult task. You might find the right colour of rug, or a rug which uses the right textures and wool, but maybe not the right pattern or combination of colours.

Admittedly, you might stumble across a pre-designed rug which is suitable for the room, but a custom made rug will ensure everything is absolutely perfect first time.

Choices, Choices 

A bespoke rug: Your design. Your colours. Your style.

With over two hundred shades of colours to choose from, you can make sure for definite that your rug has the colour which matches the room to perfection. The design is entirely up to you, too - so go wild, or stay subtle, it's up to you.

What's more, you can even go to the extreme detail of choosing the specific yarn texture for the rug - whether you like a normal 'cut pile' rug, or 'loop pile' - or if you prefer a 'faux silk' yarn, which adds sparkle and style to your design. It doesn't end there, though - choose a yarn type for specific areas of your design and really bring your rug to life.

A border for the rug? Maybe no border? And what size? Small or large? It's up to you - but the key to tying your room together and finding that 'finishing touch' is often only a rug away.

 

Design A Rug Online

The internet is full of weird and wonderful websites, software and creations. One which you perhaps haven't stumbled across yet, is an online rug designer.

Creativity is something most people find enthralling and can spend hours enjoying. Whether you've got the money to spend on buying a rug for your home or not, it's still an enjoyable experience to see all the sorts of designs you can come up with, the variations in colours and marvel and what could be reality one day.

Just the same as spending hour upon hour creating the perfect coloured template for a blog, a dream home in a game, or creating your fantasy football team; creating a rug of your own is no different. From the size of the rug, whether you want some minuscule or gigantic, it's up to you.

From the very basics, with the likes of the physical design being able to be completely hand drawn, all the way to the materials used on the rug itself, the entire look and feel of the rug is down to you, literally. While you might think that wool is wool, there's subtle differences there too. The direction of the wool can have a unique visual effect, or you can fit sections of the rug with 'silk' looking wool to create a shine and attraction in a certain area.

While you can spend hour upon hour making your own creations and dreaming about what could one day be a reality, there's also the fact that you can order your own rug online straight away. For those with the budget available, you can create your rug's design online, and either print out your creation to bring the design into a flooring retailer to be ordered for you - or, save the design and buy rugs online with minimal hassle. Most sites then assign a local retailer to you, who can order and create the rug for you, to be delivered within a matter of weeks.

What's more, the software is easy to use and completely free. The software comes from a group of retailers across the UK too, so you know it's safe. Once you're done creating your perfect rug, a great feature of the program is the ability to then take that design, and place it within a lifestyle shot - really allowing you to see exactly what your rug would look like in the real world.

So, have you got a bit of a blank area in the front room you'd like to fill? Spend a few minutes dreaming away, and see what creation you can come up with, by using the online rug builder.