Flooring

Brian laid down new flooring in our apartment. The old flooring was not only filthy with dirt and paint splatter (not ours), but badly damaged from water and wear. We knew that refinishing the wood floors was an impossible task for us, not only financially but also in our lack of tools. Therefore, we decided to get IKEA brand laminate flooring. We went with the cheapest, the SLATTEN, at 65 cents a square foot.

What IKEA doesn't tell you, however, are that the additional costs make the flooring much more expensive. Brian and I ended up going over our budget because you also need the plastic liner that goes under the floor, spacers, a rubber mallet, a tool to help you tap the floor in, a miter saw (or table saw), quarterround trim and transition pieces to use between rooms. Luckily, by shear happenstance, IKEA was out of a lot of these tools and we ended up buying them at Lowes where they turned out to be cheaper.

Above, you can see the beginning of plastic being laid down over the wood floors. Below, you can see the beginning of the work, where Brian had laid out a few pieces.

Here you can see Brian taping down more of the plastic and the part he had finished behind him:

The flooring took significantly longer than either one of us expected. While Brian laid down flooring, I primed and painted the kitchen. When he finished the bedroom, I started moving up bedroom stuff from our old apartment. It took days to lay down. Only yesterday did Brian finally finish laying the quarterround trim and the transition pieces.

What made this flooring difficult? Our rooms. Not only are there radiators and metal pipes, but the floor is also uneven and the walls are not square. Brian had to cut with a jigsaw many of the pieces. It was frustrating work for him but he did a fabulous job. I will post more pictures of the finished floors as we get done putting stuff away. I swear, we are almost there!