trying to match new wood to your current wood will be a near-impossibility. if you want the floors to match, you'll have to either strip and refinish the DR wood at the same time that the new kitchen wood gets finished, or replace the DR wood floor completely, which, yes, would be a lot more expensive.

i actually prefer tile in kitchens, but i can't say for sure since i haven't seen your space.

I had wood in my DR and nasty old vinyl in my kitchen and decided to make it all travertine tile. I was worried about matching the wood, which is also in the adjacent living room and foyer, but have since learned it might not have been so difficult. With my layout, having two different floors would have looked terrible and would never have worked. Plus, the bigger, more open feeling I was going for by knocking down the wall would have been diminished significantly. I knocked it down to make it one big room, and two floors would have kept it looking like two rooms.

Check out this thread: http://ths.gardenweb.com/forums/load/kitchbath/msg061054235331.html

bill_v posted a pic that has hardwood against granite. It helped me visualize how different materials in that tone might look.

Here is a link that might be useful: non-wood floor thread

Hi positano! I posted a thread about that just for you :-)

Here is a link that might be useful: thread re: HW floors for positano

Hi, just wanted to give you a bit more hope. I just did an addition up over my garage which connected to my upper hallway. The floor guy did a great job of matching my original hardwoods in both wood and finish, and the color was a custom color that he had to recreate. We put a header across the doorway to avoid having to interlace and avoid having to refinish the old wood. I personally like the look of a header in the doorway.

As for price, as I recall hardwood is about the same cost as a decent carpet (relevant for my FR but not your kitchen or DR, obviously) but I don't remember the price per square foot.

Anita

If the wood in the dining room is not engineered it should be easy to match the two rooms if you refinish the dining room at the same time you lay the wood for the kitchen. I added new oak hardwood to my dining room and it matches perfectly the 15 year old hardwood in the kitchen, which was refinished at the same thime the new hardwood was installed. Refinishing the dining room should be pretty reasonable if you do it at the same time you install the new wood floor. I'm taking about finished in place hardwood, not engineered.

In our recent addition, we opened our kitchen to the great room. We put slate tiles in the kitchen, and we brought the cherry planks in the great room right up to the end of the island. It looks wonderful.

Cat mom,
Thanks so much for posting that info. I can't believe I missed it, I'm on here all the time! I'm going to get an estimate for adding wood to the DR.

Holligator- You have a great point about having one floor make the space seem bigger, that's the whole reason we are taking down the wall.

oofasis- Do you have any pictures of slate and the cherry planks?

Thanks for the links and info!