Hardwood Floors February/March 2026

“With everything else, a set price could cause you to lose all the profit for that particular job,” advises Lynn. “Spell out what you are going to do with your time and material. Put an hourly rate on your time, and everything material-wise is marked up reasonably. You can take historic restoration as far as the client wants to take it. Some want perfection, some want it just functional, and some want to get through a few more years. Know your client’s expectations.”

“You can’t just go to the lumber yard and buy some fir flooring and put it in and expect it to match. I think the hardest part is matching up the year of the flooring and being able to find stuff from that era.” — Steve Nutter, Steve Nutter Cabinetry and Specialty Flooring

Caran suggests abiding by the following principles: “Preserving the floor’s integrity and functionality, its educational, cultural, and historical value for future generations, always working with respect for the original materials and techniques, and maintaining their authenticity while ensuring the reversibility of any materials used.” He adds that if you want to repair parquet as they did back then, you must think as they did back then. So, think of hand scraping or hand planing as the purest form of craftsmanship. “In our work, we strive not only for its technical preservation but also for respect toward its original aesthetics, materials, and technology,” explains Caran. “You have to be gentle. If you throw a big machine on it, you’re going to take way too much of it. Especially with pine floors,” says Nutter. “Sometimes you’re just better off taking the time and doing it by hand, which can be time-consuming.” When the work is complete, it should not be noticeable that a repair or restoration took place. Lynn notes that some old floors have been waxed so many times they cannot hold a modern finish, and you may have to go back to wax. “You have to observe the existing floor, the length, the texture, the color, the sheen, everything about it. If you miss one of those, like the sheen or the texture, it’s going to look odd, but when you hit every one of them, it’s first class.” What lies beneath the wood is another potential issue. “You don’t dare put a nail, a fastener, or drill a hole through the floorboard without knowing what’s underneath there,” advises Lynn. “You have to carefully remove a few boards to inspect it, and anticipate that there’s a gas line, a power line, a water line, or electrical wires. I’ve seen it all. You pull it up, and it’s the wild west underneath there, so you have to be really careful.” Safety precautions also should be taken when working with reclaimed wood from old barns, textile factories, boxcars, railroad ties, and more. Sancic has procedures to get it ready to go into a house.

Universal Floors worked on wood floors in the Decatur House in Washington, D.C., which was built in 1818.

PHOTO COURTESY OF UNIVERSAL FLOORS INC.

“We always are looking for contaminants that could be on the wood, such as fertilizer, old motor oil, or stuff that would be harmful if you put it back into new home construction, if you remanufactured it. We can identify chemicals or things that shouldn’t be on the wood that would affect it before we run it through our process,” says Sancic. “We heat treat everything to 160 degrees and equalize the moisture content in it.”

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