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Old house, new floors: how to age the wood

By: Shannon Lee , Contributing Writer
In: Home Improvement Tips

The patina of old floors is unique. The markings, scratches, stains, and obvious signs of well-used years are part of the charm of purchasing an old house. If you are very lucky, you moved into an old house that had equally old floors. But in many houses, those floors have been replaced somewhere along the way. Whether it was by necessity or a desire to make things look more modern, replacing old floors with newer ones often leaves the house looking as though something just isn't quite right.

Reclaimed wood is an option, but that can get very expensive. For those on a budget, working with what you have is probably the best bet. Rather than deal with the pristine surface of a brand-new floor, take matters into your own hands and make those floors look as though they have always been there.

How to distress a hardwood floor

Some people go to great lengths to keep their new floors absolutely perfect. But for those who love old houses, distressed floors are the goal. Distressing a new floor uses a few simple techniques and tools, and you might be surprised at just how easy the process is. What might not surprise you, however, is the amount of time it takes to truly distress a floor until it looks as though it has been in place for decades. Expect to drop many long weekends and countless hours on the project before it's complete.

To get started, gather the items that work best for distressing a hardwood floor. These include a basic wood scraping tool -- you can purchase this at any home improvement store. You will also need a thick, sturdy wire brush. Beyond that, let your imagination run wild with the use of heavy chains, hammers, ice picks, and other heavy-duty tools that can leave serious marks in a plank of wood. Invest in a small wood-burning tool if you want to make things even more interesting. You might also want to use a variety of stains and finishes to help create that "lived on" patina that old floors have.

Before you take any of these tools to your floor, do a bit of homework. The idea of a distressed floor is to make it look as natural as possible. Start with examining floors that really are a century old. What stands out about them? What kind of patterns have formed? Take a multitude of pictures and keep them on hand when it's time to work on your own floor.

To get started, simply get down on the floor and begin to scrape away. Move the scraping tool with the grain and avoid any knots in the wood. This will help break down the surface and make it look older. Add random scratches with the wire brush. You might have to put some serious elbow grease into both of these techniques, so plan for frequent breaks while you work.

Scraping will form the base of the distressed look. Once the scraping is done, make it your own by bringing in the heavy-duty tools. Drop chains on the floor and drag them around. Hit the floor here and there with the hammer to create indentations. Use the ice pick to create the look of worm holes in the wood. Break out the wood-burning tool and put a few lines in the wood here and there to add character -- this is especially striking near the fireplace.

Be sure to scrape heavily in areas where traffic flows, so as to recreate the look of generations of feet wearing away at the hardwood. You can also use a touch of stain here and there to further the look. When it's all done, gently sand the floors by hand -- never with a machine! -- just enough to smooth out the surface and get rid of any splinters.

And then sit back and enjoy a lovely floor that looks like it was there for generations, not just a few months.

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