Janice349- I've had smartstrand in 2 different housrs, plus a client had WHITE smartstrand in their house with 3 toddlers, and they all looked brand new 3 yrs later. In spite of my elderly dog having accidents. Perhaps you were given something else, but we're told it was smartstrand. I always got the mid grade frieze. Client had a plush. I love smartstrand and wold tear out new carpet of a different brand so I can install it. It didn't even mat down on stairs. When I went to sell my house, I didn't even clean it...just vacuumed and it still looked new.

I don't have any pics downloaded right now. However, I can tell you how we ended up choosing Paper Moon--We knew we wanted a white/off-white/cream color, so we went to the local dealer and got our hands on some sample cuts of carpet in all the colors we were considering. Then we placed all the samples on the floor in a row in the rooms we were carpeting to see how they looked with our natural & artificial lighting and shadows. We were able to eliminate all but 3 rather quickly. Then it just came down to whether we wanted a stark white (Grecian Column), a softer white (Paper Moon) or a beigey white (can't remember that one's name--it was eliminated next anyway). We have been very happy with the color and I would recommend it if you're looking for a soft looking white color. Now, how to get larger samples than what they have at Lowe's--If you go into a carpet store that has the Smartstrand, they will have a large display with squares of carpet samples in every color set on the diagonal. Inside that display are more sample squares in each color for customers to take home & test out. The squares are the same size as the ones on the front of the display (about 5x5 or 6x6). While they're not a door mat size sample, they are larger than the samples in the books at Lowe's. If you need a few of one color to show a larger area, that shouldn't be a big deal either. When you lay the samples out, I would put down a piece of plywood, a bed sheet or blanket to cover existing carpeting as it will give you a blank slate to work with to make your decision. Hope this helps!

Hi all, Just wanted to circle back for the benefit of anyone in the future who looks at this question. We went back and compared the carpet we chose to the "true friezes" and "true saxonies" they had. This Essential Living is something Karastan calls a "textured saxony." Fiber is much, much thicker, and considerable looser than a real saxony. Unlike the saxony, you can't make lasting footprints (or draw smiley faces as my son did), in the Essential Living carpet. About the same texture as the friezes, just a teeny bit longer and a little bit looser, and a bit softer. It's not as long as I remember it, and carpet vendor says they've had lots of experience putting it on stairs with no wear or safety issues. With his guidance we did scale the padding on the stairs back to a dense, thinner, pretty unyielding felt that should reduce concerns about too much padding/curve on stair treads. Thanks so much for all your help!

We had Smarstrand put down 3years ago and I can attest to the stain resistence. Within a month, our photo printer went berserk and shot out ink sitting on top of the photo paper instead on in it. Can you picture multi color pin size dots on top of light beige carpet? I just kept saying to myself, flush with water, flush with water. That's what I did and then used my shop vac to get up the water and blotted with paper towels. No stain outline what so ever. Of course I freaked out when the first pitcher of water seemed to spread the color but it all turned out good. I purchased mine from a local carpet store and used a 10 lb moisture pad. Mine is a plush. Another plus - no new carpet smell or outgassing.