Nesting box modifications in Eglu Go Up

[The Dogmother]

As you may know, I'm not a fan of carpets, and in most of my house I have stripped the original Victorian floorboards. I am currently working on the attic room, which will be a bedroom; the floorboards up there are in poor condition and with gaps which i have had to patch with chipboard.

 

Clearly, I am going to have to carpet it with something but the wool carpet which I like will cost over £1k for that room (incl. underlay and fitting), I have looked at cheaper, polypropylene carpets (which I hate the idea of) and they come in at half that price, but look and feel poor in comparison. I'd prefer as natural a flooring as possible and wouldn't consider laminates as they are out of keeping with the period of the house.

 

Any ideas? The area includes some steep and narrow stairs, and I eventually intend to use the same floor covering on the first floor landing and the stairs down to the ground floor. I'd be interested to hear your advice and experiences.

[Egluntyne]

How about the sisal type of carpet?

[JS1]

As someone who compromised and went for a cheaper carpet (still 90 per cent wool, mind), I'd say I regret it almost every day in life - partly, I'm sure, because a pale-ish green stair carpet was a completely stupid idea with two greyhounds, a hill-running husband and a chicken-keeping me; my excuse is it looked darker in the shop. If I were doing it again, I'd spend as much as I could reasonably afford.

 

Could you get rugs or kelim to cover the bits where there's chipboard and wax or varnish the rest?

[The Dogmother]

How about the sisal type of carpet?

 

That was one of my first ideas, but the cheapest is the same price as the wool carpet

 

.... Could you get rugs or kelim to cover the bits where there's chipboard and wax or varnish the rest?

 

Unfortunately the patched bits of floor are in random and very awkward places, so would look odd with rugs on them - thanks anyway.

[Cinnamon]

Yes,Sisal is expensive

Some laminates can look really good,or you could get a real wooden floor either solid or a thin layer over chipbaord.

A friend has a Bamboo floor which is beautiful & is apparently very hard wearing - Hubby fitted it & said it was a joy to work with.

I don't think she got hers from Wickes,but this looks nice:

CLICK

And a lovely big rug,for cosyness.

[The Dogmother]

I had to go for solid (oak) wood flooring in the bathroom as the original floor in there was in a bad way. It is double the price of the wool carpet at £40/square metre. Thankfully the bathroom is only small it looks lovely but not like the original floorboards - it's almost too perfect

 

FYI, the wool carpet is £22/Msq whereas the cheap carpet is £11.90/Msq

Edited March 29, 2011 by Guest

[chickric]

We've recently got rid of the last of our carpet and now have beautiful bamboo flooring in the living room and up the stairs and landing.

It isn't laminate but real wood, proper tongue and grove and is very hard wearing, relativly easy to lay (I managed, even up the stairs ), isn't at all cold and is apparently very environmentally friendly.

The range we looked at went from about £15 to £25 per square meter.

[The Dogmother]

Which range was that chickric?

[chickric]

We got ours from here.

Highly recommend the company, very good service.

We were ordering samples from everywhere we could find

[The Dogmother]

Thanks Ric, they look lovely, but perhaps more suited for a modern house. The picture below gives an idea of what the floorboards in the rest of the house look like....

 

 

... to give you an idea. Something similar would be great

 

I have looked at using reclaimed floorboards, which would be ideal but they are about £40-50/Msq

[Cinnamon]

We got ours from here.

Highly recommend the company, very good service.

We were ordering samples from everywhere we could find

 

Ah ha!

That is where my friend got hers from, & as I said,its gorgeous

 

Clare,I am sure I saw some sort of fake wooden floorboards in B&Q or somewhere - they looked very convincing.

 

We gout our solid oak floor from a reclaim company,but I can't remember where.

A pal got hers from an old dance hall which was being refurbished....keep an eye out,you might just get lucky!

[The Dogmother]

I'm looking, believe me, I just don't have enough time to trawl around all the reclamation sites. I'm hoping to get out to one in Croughton this weekend if I get a spare half an hour.

[Christian]

Even new pine floor boards, with the right stain would look good. Maybe shift the old ones around where they will be seen, replace the dodgy ones and fill the gaps with new boards where they won't be so obvious?

[Omletina Kyckling]

If you fancy a trip to Yorkshire, there is a mill near here (in Holmfirth, near Huddersfield) who make carpets for various carpet places, they are 80% wool 20% polypropylene and are end of rolls (but still huge quantities) - they cost about £30 a sqm if you buy from Allied or wherever, or if you buy at the mill they are around £5 sqm (or were a few years ago). I got the carpet for my lounge in my old house, in a fabulous victorian red and was really pleased with it.

They do most colours, you can ring them for samples. You would need to collect it though!

[Alis girls]

Did you arrange your doggies like that or did they just flop down? OH was shocked when he saw the pic - he said "whats up with them?"

Carpets are a nightmare - cat magnet - end up being clawed to death - even floor boards which are a bit past their best in MHO are better. And yes I do have carpet in spare room and stairs - usually stained cos someones walked in summat.

Pardon my OH's ignorance shouldn;t read over my shoulder

[The Dogmother]

Ooo, that sounds good Omletina, would you mind letting me have the details of that place and I'll have a look. A jaunt up there isn't out of the question for the right carpet.

 

Alis Girls, they just flopped down like that after a good run - it was the evening after I'd adopted Cyrus so he was still very new. Lurchers do a lot of lounging around

[Omletina Kyckling]

It's Westwood yarns and their telephone number is 01484 685215. If you ring them up you could ask them to send you a price list and some colour samples. I'm assuming they still do their carpets direct from the mill!!

I'm only about 5 miles away from here so we could either meet up for a coffee, or you would be most welcome to come up and stay overnight to make more of a trip of it! x

[Alis girls]

Glad to hear they are ok - fine looking canines and lovely picture. Serves my OH right for being nosey - he thought someone had posted a piccie of expired dogs - I mean as if it would be allowed. Men

[majorbloodnock]

You may remember I posted a thread recently about carpeting. The gist of it was that many carpet retailers use the carpet itself as the headline price to attract customers, then stiff them on the cost of underlay and other accessories. By getting the carpet, underlay, gripper rods and so on separately (online for all but the carpet, for instance), and paying a fitter specifically just for the job of fitting it (or doing it yourself if you feel comfortable with it), you can save a huge amount. For instance, instead of gripper rods at £1.50 per metre from a retailer, I got a box of 100 1.5m lengths for £23.

 

I got my underlay and other stuff from http://www.tradepriced.co.uk/index.html. In all, for 2 bedrooms and some stairs, I reckon I got significantly better quality and saved about £400-500.

[craftyhunnypie]

Is there no carpet suitable on preloved? Sometimes someone moves house & hates the carpet, sometimes shops sell off their excess on preloved. Worth a try?

 

Emma.x

[The Dogmother]

Thanks for that Omletina, I will give them a ring today and see what they have to offer.

 

Great advice Major, we have a small local carpet firm who do fitting - they can't offer me any good deals on the goods but I'll ask if they just do fitting and could get the gubbins separately.

 

Great advice folks

[Aunty e]

I rather like John Lewis's cheapest carpet - when I was looking a couple of years ago it was £7 a metre with free underlay and it was really nice. It came in biscuity sorts of colours, oatmeal, ginger etc We're currently living with the world's most repulsive and filthy carpet as I just can't afford to replace it yet. We're hoping to extend at the back of the house and then put a wooden floor down with underfloor heating. I've just painted the floorboards upstairs and put down rugs as flooring is just so expensive. Even cheap laminate would have been hundreds

[bluekarin]

I rather like John Lewis's cheapest carpet - when I was looking a couple of years ago it was £7 a metre with free underlay and it was really nice. It came in biscuity sorts of colours, oatmeal, ginger etc

 

do you have a link for this? There doesn't seem to be any carpet on their website, which is odd as my friends bought their carpet from there at the end of last year

[EmmaJC]

Have you thought about painting the floor? We've painted our staircase (treads and risers) red and it looks fantastic.

 

Farrow and Ball do a floor paint version of all of their colours and it's really hard wearing. It took us 4 coats to get the colour right but it cost us £40 in total to do the lot. I know it seems like a crime with such lovely boards, but if they're past it anyway you're not missing out.

[The Dogmother]

I would but they are patched in paces with chipboard as there proved to be some boards missing