Taking care of your hardwood floor – treatments and restoration  

Hardwood has been used for flooring for centuries, but for the majority of that time was available to only a select few in society, the rich and the aristocratic, due to the high costs involved. It was also a poor choice for many of those years as lack of knowledge of care and installation led to a floor which lasted very little time. Thankfully today things have changed, hard wood is available to the majority but if it seems classy – there is a historical content to explain it.

Thankfully knowledge on how to install and care for hardwood flooring has also improved and it is now a standard choice which looks great and should last for years. Caring for a hardwood floor is different to other materials such as stone or ceramics, even vinyl due to its propensity to suffer scratches and also the damage that can be caused by spillages.

Rather than focus on cleaning, it is best to focus on different forms of protecting and treating your floor.

All (hard) floors should have a sealant applied, it is a standard recommendation, but an essential one due to the nature of wood. In most cases a spillage is a nuisance because it can cause surface staining which can, if left untouched, become difficult to shift. In the case of wood, a spillage can actually mark the wood directly (wine or coffee) but more worryingly it can also seep into the gaps between planks or slabs and can warp or damage the wood over time – even if the spillage is only water. For this reason wooden floors are not often found in bathrooms and kitchens.

A sealant will protect the floor to some extent but it is still important to clean up spillages as soon as they occur, and protect the sealant and the surface of the floor with regular sweeping with a broom, but also a finer dust mop, as this will aid your maintenance and cleaning efforts.

It helps if you know what has previously been applied to your floor, and if you contact a wood floor cleaning company they will be able to recommend further courses of action. If you are not sure if a sealant has been applied previously, just place a few drops of water on the surface, if they float then the answer is yes – it should be obvious.

One of the differences between hardwood and other floor types is that if the floor gets marked or stained you may have a problem. If the marking is just a surface build-up of bacteria, grime or residue from spillages, you can probably just clean and surface buff the floor yourself.

If, however, the wood itself has become marked or stained, you may find yourself in a situation where the actual surface of the wood needs to be sanded to trip the top layer and restore its natural look. It can then be cleaned, polished and resealed but a wood floor cleaning specialist will need to do this for you.

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