We are always attracted to wool carpets (just go to them without knowing they are wool initially). IMO there is nothing like it but I think that for wall to wall I wouldn't choose it. We have it in our bedroom (Karastan) and it has held up very well for about 20 years but unless you get spots out immediately it is difficult - that is with plain colors. If you have a pattern of course that is different and our wool orientals with patterns never show anything and will last forever! For our side porch we are going with a Karastan nylon. I hope we don't get any outgassing though.

An upright vacuum is usually recommended for low level wall to wall carpet. Like you I like both the miele and the panasonic. I have a miele marin and old miele champagne which both do fine on the carpet with the power head; just be sure to adjust the level on the brush and dial back on the suction to the icon labeled carpet. I've used the Sebo sometimes badged as a miele upright and panasonics with great success. It's important to be sure both the filter and the bag are clean and not full respectively. You would have a lot of lint from wool carpet when it is new, not so much from a synthetic. If you have pets like I do, it adds to the volume of the hair/lint in the bag. Bagless uprights are a mess to clean. If you don't clean them regularly, it is an even bigger mess and may cause the motor to burn out. Given that, Dysons are overpriced, cheaper Eurekas don't have much suction, and Hoover wind tunnels are useless. If you have carpet, the stick vacuums probably won't work for more than a fast pick-up. Yes, I had to work my way through the vacuum appliance aisle to finally learn that you get what you pay for. Good Luck

I have not got wool wall-to-wall myself, but grew up with all wool wall to wall. It was very durable, held up under 5 kids and a couple of cats. Still,for a kids room I would say perhaps a room sized rug (can have the edges bound of the carpeting that you like) or even smaller (for ease of removal to clean). I have had several wool area rugs that were stained by kid's art supplies - marker, crayon, paint, nail polish etc. and have had good luck removing the stains using my favorite stain remover. When they got dirty enough overall, it was easy to take them outside on a sunny day, hang over the patio chairs, soap them up with rug cleaner, then rinse with the hose. - they get much cleaner than from a carpet machine (and you don't pull out half the fibers either) and dry pretty quickly in the sun. Word of warning - that only works with a loomed rug (ie woven into backing). Those rugs that are fibers glued to a backing will fall apart if gotten wet - & that includes using a carpet cleaning machine on them.

Thanks both. I think probably need a carpet that I can get bound. The space is roughly 10'x18' so the closest standard size is a 9x12 which would leave the space looking awkward. I have looked in a local carpet store and not come up with much. I've used poly rugs in a flatwoven style (which is what I want) before and am not happy with the performance. I find that the fibers begin to fuzz/shred/break down very quickly and while they are easy to clean, they seem to show dirt easily. This may be particular to poly in a flatweave style, but that's the style I'm looking for.