It’s been done for a while now, so it’s high time that we share the details of our living room floor restoration with you. It’s one of our favourite makeovers so far and made an unbelievable difference to the whole room.
One of the first things we did when moving in was to remove the smelly, dirty and dog pee-stained carpet. It was too disgusting for words!
Straight away we knew that we’d like to keep the original exposed floorboards and luckily the condition of them, if even dirty and stained, was actually quite good.
Before we could even think about sanding the floor, we had to get some of the major building work out of the way – we had the electrics sorted, the radiator replaced, a new fireplace fitted and, as you can see in the picture, the whole room replastered.
Then we could finally tackle the floor. As you all know we like to tackle as many projects as possible ourselves, this is one of the few ones we decided to pay to have done.
We could have probably done it ourselves, but after working out the costs and getting some quotes from a few local floor sanding companies, we were really surprised to find that paying someone to sand the floor was only slightly more expensive than doing it ourselves.
In the end, the company we chose did a great job and it was amazing to watch the quick transformation. After just a few minutes of work, this is what our floor already looked like
What a difference sanding Edwardian floorboards can make! It probably would have taken us a whole weekend to do the work ourselves but our contractor finished the job in just a few hours.
The difference is amazing. It’s hard to believe that it’s the same floor!
All in all, it cost about £15/m² including all sanding and varnishing. If we’d wanted to have the floor stained, it would have worked out slightly more expensive. In general, the costs will obviously depend on the condition of your floor and also on the area where you live.
This is what our living room is like now.
We love the floor and it’s holding up really well. There are a few little marks and dents here and there, but nothing major. We also found an amazing way to remove dents in the wood.
Since paying for this floor to be sanded, we have attempted the job ourselves. It’s actually easier than you probably expect and we’ve shared a full guide on exactly how to sand your floors and achieve a professional finish that you can read here!
We’d like to eventually sand all the floors in the house. Do you also have wooden floors? Should we have the exposed wooden floors everywhere or should we have carpet in some of the rooms? Did you realise that sanding Edwardian floorboards could be so quick?
Yash says
Hi , We are in tge process of buying a house and I plan to expose the wood in the house so, it is economical.
Can you please let me know the company you went for.
We live in UK
Thanks in advance.
Yash
Christine says
The company we used for the floor no longer exists but we sanded almost all floors by ourselves. It’s not difficult to do but it is hard work! You might find this post helpful where we’ve listed lots of resources!
Have fun in your new home!
Cx
rosie says
Hi, I found your blog whilst researching how easily we can strip the floorboards in our house. I wondered if you have any problems with draught / cold? Is the downstairs cold from the ground cavity? Are your upstairs rooms colder than before? I doubt we have insulation beneath the floorboards. We have horrid carpets at the moment and can’t afford to carpet every room!
Thanks for writing an amazing blog and I’ll be sure to check in for more tips :)
Christine says
Hi Rosie! Let’s start at the beginning ;-). First of all, it’s fairly easy to sand floorboards, but it is really hard work! You can see our budget breakdown and how we did it here. Our upstairs rooms aren’t colder than before, but downstairs is a different matter. We’ve insulated under our floors and also sealed the gaps between the skirting and floor. It’s something that you will definitely have to do, as it will be too cold otherwise. All in all it’s actually better now than it was before. The insulation is definitely way more effective than the horrible carpet we had before. Don’t use caulk to fill the gap between your skirting and floor – it’ll crack and look awful after just a short while. This is how we did it.
Hope that’s some help! Good luck, we’d love to know how you get on!
Cx
Magali@TheLittleWhiteHouse says
I love wooden floor. I have some upstairs under layers and layers of linoleum and plywood… It’s my dream one day to allow them to see the day light! I wood uncover every wooden floor possible if I were you. They look so lovely in your living-room.
Christine says
Thanks Magali! I love the wooden floors, you should definitely try to restore yours, too! The original floorboard are under the laminate flooring in the hallway, too – I can’t tell you how tempted I am to just rip up the laminate and start restoring the floor!
Cx