Wood floors have a classic, timeless look, and for good reason – humans have been laying down wood flooring for more than four hundred years. Europeans first began to cover their bare dirt floors with wood planks in the 1600s. Today, reclaimed wood flooring represents the pinnacle of human development as far as tree-based flooring is concerned.

Reclaimed wood floors are constructed of recycled lumber from a variety of sources, such as shipping containers, old barn beams and gymnasium seats. Because reclaimed wood flooring is fairly new to the residential décor scene, many people consider it unique enough on its own. However, we all have an innate need for self-expression, especially in our homes. If you’re hoping to turn your recycled lumber flooring into a unique personal expression, the following are some tips to get you started.

Wood Stains

Being an organic material, wood will happily soak up certain substances, including stains. Applying stain to a wood floor is a big job, but it can make a huge difference. Before staining your wood floors, make sure you’re choosing a color you’ll love by conducting a color test. Gather stains of various colors that appeal to you, and line up the cans of stains along an area of floor that has been sanded to the bare wood. Paint a sample of each stain that is large enough to allow you to see how the wood will react. Let the stains set, and live with the results for a couple of days. This will help you figure out which stains will work well with your floor.

Especially adventurous home renovators can mix and match different stains to create a totally unique look. Half-and-half mixtures generally work best for this. Once the whole floor has been stained, you can also experiment with different sealers. Oil-based polyurethane sealers, for instance, usually deepen and enrich stain colors.

Whitewashing and Distressing

If you’d like a different finish but you’re tired of staining, consider whitewashing or pickling your wood floors. Pickling and whitewashing are both glazing techniques; they create a unique glaze that doesn’t penetrate the wood like stain does. Professional interior designers use pickling and whitewashing to mask the natural color and grain of wood floors while adding a translucent finish. Apply these techniques after sanding your reclaimed wood flooring but before adding a seal.

Distressing is another popular trend in the world of recycled lumber wood floors. Old wood floors have a wonderful texture about them; over years of use they earn random defects that convey personality rather than decay. You can give your new reclaimed wood flooring its own unique personality via distressing. If you’re ordering new wood floors, consider ordering recycled timber that has been distressed by industrial presses. Otherwise, you can hire a craftsman to hand-distress your wood floors using burlap bags filled with nuts and bolts.

Mixing Different Timbers

Before the advent of tongue-and-groove wood flooring, it was difficult to achieve a perfectly flat, consistent surface. Today, consistent tongue-and-groove flooring allows consumers to easily mix and match different types of recycled lumber. For instance, you could match light oak with darker, richer Doug fir planks. By alternating different timbers, you can create matchless wood floors. To create a consistent overall effect, use floorboards with the same width.

Some reclaimed wood flooring manufacturers fold this customization technique into their product line. For instance, Viridian Wood sells several shades of Jakarta Market Blend, a line of reclaimed wood flooring sourced from shipping crates. Because the shipping crates are composed of various exotic hardwoods, Jakarta Market Blend reclaimed wood floors boast a variety of tones and colors that come together to create a stunning, unified effect.

Borders and Inlays

In the early days of wood floors, only the wealthiest people could afford to add borders and inlays to their wood flooring. Today, however, it is far less labor intensive to add these visual ornaments to reclaimed wood flooring. From a simple border of a lighter wood to a complex parquet pattern, there are countless ways to customize a wood floor using inlay techniques.

As you can see, reclaimed wood flooring is anything but boring. Beyond your original choice of recycled lumber, you can customize wood floors using the techniques listed above.