Some homeowners love the look and feel of traditional hardwoods throughout their home. If you’d like to mix things up a little and show your unique personality, you can choose an alternative flooring option that will look beautiful in your home. Soon, all your neighbors will be changing from a classic to one of these unique options too.

Concrete

When you think of cement, you’re likely envisioning the gray garage floors like those at your local mechanic’s shop. Whether it’s an entire cement slab or cement tiles, they are becoming a popular flooring choice.

Cement can be stained, painted and sealed to a polished shine. Tiles made from cement can be any style or design based on the concept that you want in your home.

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Bamboo

When it comes to choosing bamboo for the floors of your home, there are many choices of color and type. The natural color of bamboo is a light blonde that can be left alone for installation, or it can be stained with a variety of colors.

There is also a carbonized bamboo flooring that gives the bamboo a caramelized color. It’s boiled and the sugars of the bamboo are actually caramelized, which is how the wood gets its color.

Tiger bamboo is a combination of natural and carbonized wood together that creates a stripe pattern like a tiger, which is how it got the name.

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Cork

An eco-friendly option for flooring in the home is cork. The material that’s been used to stopper your favorite bottle of wine can be used to produce elegant flooring. There are so many shades and textures to choose from that it’s a beautiful, inexpensive and environmentally-friendly way to spice up your home.

Along with being a green flooring choice, it’s also hypoallergenic as well as soft enough to spend hours standing on it every single day. This makes it the perfect flooring for the cook who spends hours in the kitchen making the family healthy meals.

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Rubber

Like cork, rubber can be heaven for the person who is standing at the sink or at the stove for hours preparing meals for the family. It’s great as flooring for laundry rooms too.

Rubber is simple to clean and is durable for those families who can be rough on their flooring. That also makes it great for a mudroom where the family might shed their dirty, muddy shoes after being outside.

Painted

Anyone looking for a unique way to change their flooring might choose to paint the floor instead of ripping out the current wood and replacing it. It can be beautiful with one color like those that are reminiscent of a cottage, or it can be changed into beautiful tile-like squares.

When painting the floor, it’s vital that there’s a sealant applied to the work to ensure it doesn’t wear down or scrape with people walking on it. It might be perfect to paint the floors in a room that doesn’t see a ton of foot traffic.

Whether you choose concrete, cork or rubber for the floors in your home, you can pick a style, color and design that fits with your unique personality. Many of these alternatives to hardwood are also less expensive than traditional wood floor coverings.