Greyspace’s top 5 tips on how to maintain your hardwood floors during the winter months.
Wooden floors are an asset in your home you’ll want to protect all year round. With the weather being wetter and muddier during this time of year, now is more important than ever to ensure your hardwood floors are properly maintained and look after to ensure the longest lifespan.
Below are Greyspace’s top 5 tips in doing just that…
1) Use mats at entrance and exterior doors
By using mats at all entrances and exterior doors will ensure a good majority of damp and dirt from the outside will be trapped resulting in less being walked through.
2) Shoes off at the door
Wood floors are highly durable and obviously much better than carpets are at coping with dirt and moisture. That said, you don’t want them to become overly dirty because it will make them much harder to clean.
Constantly letting wet or muddy shoes onto your wood floors will cause dirt to build up which will be harder to get off. It could also damage your floors over time, with mud, gravel and shoe treads causing small scratches. So when you get home or guest arrive shoes straight off!
3) Cleaning
Cleaning your wood floor with a microfibre spray mop will remove the mud and and spillages without too much hassle. If you can do it straight away, try not to leave it longer than a day as it will become harder to get off. Cleaning your main entrances and high traffic areas daily is the perfect way to stay on top of things.
4) Protective finishings
Finally, it’s best to keep your wood floors protected from anything that does get on them. A coat of oil or lacquer will stop moisture soaking into the wood as well as protecting it from scratching. That will make muddy footprints easier to clean off and ensure your wood floors still look great after cleaning.
Make sure your wood floors have a protective finish applied when they’re installed and be sure to sand down and reapply if they ever start to look worn.
5) Use the right cleaning products
Don’t opt for cheaper unknown floor cleaning products that can be found on the supermarket shelf, these may not have the best track record for unfinished hardwood flooring and may cause more damage than good. If you’re investing in a beautiful hardwood floor, make sure you also invest in the right products to look after it that are recommended by the professionals and have a great track record, not only for thorough cleaning but for maintaining the woods natural beauty. Greyspace Flooring highly recommend the BONA cleaning range, they have products for every type of hardwood flooring, finished or unfinished and are available from our showroom.
