STAINED HARDWOOD FLOORS

Michael Holigan: Inlaid wood adds real visual interest to a hardwood floor. And today we're going to show you how we gave a 38-year-old dining room floor a dramatic facelift. Now, you might think that we pulled up some of the old planks and replaced it with new handcut wood, but while a renovated floor has all the intricate charm of an inlaid wood floor, it's actually a clever imposter we pulled off for less than $30. You see, our floor is actually stained. Heather Mason and I go around the room marking off the two lines that will form our stripe. Next, we outline the stripe with tape. It says lacquer tape inside. Why are we using that?

Heather Mason: This green tape is going to give us a cleaner, sharper line. The adhesive on the tape is much more sticky than regular masking tape.

MH: This side's much easier because we just go right on the plank itself. We place a strip of regular masking tape on the outside edge of the green lacquer tape. This will protect the planks that are next to the area we'll be staining. In each corner of the room, the stripe will end in an intricate two-tone medallion.

HM: Okay, we're going to measure off this design as well.

MH: Since this floor is covered with layers of old varnish and wax buildup, we give it a good sanding so the stain can penetrate into the wood. Heather uses a tacky dust cloth to wipe up any dust and dirt. We're using an acrylic stain here because you can wipe it off so quickly. You don't have to wait five or fifteen minutes. You can do it in what - 30 or 60 seconds.

HM: It says 30 to 60 seconds on the bottle. We're just going to rub it in, wait the 30 to 60 and then wipe it off and then come back and do another coat.

MH: We use a lint-free cloth to apply the stain, but you can also use a foam or bristle brush if you'd like. After we let the stain set for 60 seconds we use a lint-free cloth to wipe off the excess stain. This first coat doesn't really give us the dark brown color we wanted. First couple of times it really didn't sink in that much, so we're going to go with the grain. It's a good idea with stain to go too light at first and then just keep adding stain until it gets to the exact color that you want. It's a lot easier than going too dark and trying to figure out a way to lighten it back up.

HM: If we would have started with fresh wood, the stain would have taken right off the bat real easy.

MH: Applying the stain in the same direction as the wood's grain definitely works much better. That looks great.

HM: It does.

MH: That does look like an inlaid plank.

HM: Now, what we're going to do is we are going to line our stencil up in the middle of these lines. We've got three planks on each side and we're going to come in and line the bottom lines up with each of the planks.

MH: Once the stencil is straight, press it firmly to the floor to prevent stain from seeping under the contact paper. Now we're ready to stain our corner designs. We use Q-Tips to gently brush on the stain. Again, we brush with the wood grain. Be careful around the edges of the stencil. You don't want stain to seep under the contact paper.

HM: I'm just going to gently pull, even out some of these Q-Tip brush marks. This takes a very light hand.

MH: It didn't seep under too bad.

HM: Uh-uh.

MH: We wipe up the excess stain with clean Q-Tips, then let the stain cure overnight. The next day we come back to apply our second color - a red oak. We place a clean stencil over the area we've already stained brown.

HM: Now, with this oil base we're going to start in the center and work our way to the edges because it is very runny and this contact paper isn't adhered very well. If we put it too heavy around the contact paper edge it will seep under. So, continue with the grain of the wood, long strokes in the center, and then be very careful around the edges. And what we're going to do is pull it up as soon as we can and do cleanup work.

MH: Now I've got to tell you we used a oil base stain because we liked the red color, but the acrylic gel stain is much easier to work with. You can see a little of our brown stain pulled off. We were able to touch that up pretty easily. Well, here's our great imposter. It looks beautiful, doesn't it? This stain floor treatment has all the classic style and beauty of an inlaid wood floor for a fraction of the cost. I'd say it's $30 well spent.

Purchase Video

Episode 66 1997 - 98 Season

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