I am also in the flooring dilemma in a small galley kitchen.

I think cork is wonderful but I do wonder if you will have too much brown fighting with your cabinets and current wood floors. Cork does come in various colors though so you can try samples. Cork is out for me due to my rambunctious pair of dogs.

I am strongly leaning towards Marmoleum and just ordered 6 free color samples. I think you can do some great things with it in terms of design or just using it as a solid. They have some interesting color choices. If I were you, I would be look at lightening up the kitchen floor with the darker floors in the other rooms and the walnut cabinets.

Linoleum has been around for a 100 years.
Linoleum was a good product then and still is now.
Its recipe is a known quantity.

Something changed, in the distribution channels.

Linoleum now get treated like it's yukky, and no one ever explains why.

Long live Marmoleum the expensive replacement.

Yes, I agree with Hags00 that marmoleum will be a better contrast to the walnut than cork. You could do it in a neutral, or maybe in that lovely gray-blue that Rhome410 used. Here it is: http://rhome410.blogspot.ca/p/my-kitchen.html

I'm thinking your marble has some grey in it that might work with a greyish floor.

I would not pay attention to a KD who makes faces when you mention linoleum. I would make faces back :-)

My next-door neighbors have cork floors. While they are (were) beautiful and a dream to walk/stand on, they have not worn well. They've faded badly where the sun has hit them (possibly not an issue for you), and have buckled where water is present. My oak floors in the kitchen have withstood their share of wetness. I love the look and feel of cork, but wouldn't consider it for a kitchen or bath.

We put some sort of linoleum in my mom's kitchen six or seven years ago. Granted, she is old and just has cats, but the floors look new. despite the walker and chairs dragging around on it. I love it. DH hated it.

We have wood floors that I also love that run through our own kitchen and the rest of our house (we replaced three different kinds of flooring that were sort of puzzled together when we moved in). Love linoleum for durability and colors (I was thinking about a checkerboard pattern...).

I was surprised at how many flooring stores I visited were using the word linoleum to mean vinyl and vice versa, so that might be part of your problem. That being said, there are now some great looking vinyl options, so they still shouldn't turn up their noses!

Marmoluem is a great product, and I think cork can be too. Based on a single experience I have had with each, the cork looked worn in much faster. The individual scratches weren't terrible, but it did have a more scuffed/ worn in appearence.

I'm in the same spot--can't do wood (don't want to refinish the floors that open into the kitchen), WON'T do porcelein tile (hard on my bad back and knees) so I'm trying to decide between linoleum (marmoleum) and cork. I have a huge skylight in my kitchen...so that may factor in. (I'm doing a modern kitchen.)

We had real linoleum in our old house. But by the time we got there, it was buried under glued-down carpeting. We pulled up the old carpeting and the lineoleum cleaned up like brand new. Only thing is, like linoleum does, it did have some areas where it was like bubble dented. Anyway, we proceeded to cover the linoleum up again because it was black with little off white marble lines in it....it made the ceilings look like they were only 6' high. Terrible.

And as we were stripping walls, we uncovered the wall paper she used at the time...dark red with black lines and gold flecks in it. She had a light fixture with 3 oval globes hanging that looked like UFOs.

Such was 50s decor!

We went with Amtico vinyl...warm, cushioned, quiet, durable, easy to clean, looks great...people ask us what it is as they aren't aware that it isn't real, and you can mix say stone and wood without any steps of different levels. However it is expensive. You can also customize it for anything you want.

We had them cut the broken arch in the floor to match the curve in the island and in the soffit over the island

We used their antique brass strips, made of vinyl, to match the coffering in the ceiling in the hallway space between the library and dining room...their strips weren't wide enough for us so they made them wider. (The 2 rooms are open to each other so we needed to add visual cues to make the rooms feel more separate, like the change in direction in the flooring and the columns.)

We also had them put a compass in our foyer floor. This picture shows a truer color of the flooring which is the same as in the kitchen. We had them put the rosewood border around the edge of the foyer and the hallway so the rooms all relate to each other.

Oh wow,Annie! Those floors are beautiful! Also,love your green marble columns! So pretty!

Thank you kaijutokusatsu...I'm pretty proud of the columns as I faux finished them myself....they're just fiberglass. The gold rings were a bit of a challenge...finally gold leafed them and then antiqued it to get the right look.

Annie - I have to confess, I didn't look that closely at all the vinyl options...Looking at your kitchen, maybe I should have--your floors look very smart! And you can't beat it for durability.

Is the compass also vinyl?

My choices were between cork and marmoleum.
I chose cork: love love love the feel of it, it's holding up well with my 4 year old and my big wild dog - and both of their water play in the kitchen. And it looks good.

But

I wish I'd chosen marmoleum. The pattern of my cork is too busy to give me the flexibility I want in choosing my other materials. There are many many cork patterns, though. Some calmer than others.

I was well-warned about this by several on this forum. Unfortunately I found this forum after I'd purchased my flooring and it was about to be installed. I didn't yet know enough about the level of experience here and so just didn't listen. Though there were several folks who were okay with it, too.

In retrospect, I think I should have tried to return or resell the flooring. It's boxed me in a bit.

here's a link to the discussion.

Here is a link that might be useful: Discussion on design elements, my cork floor

pawa, yes the compass is vinyl too, made to look like stone and 2 kinds of wood.

Mind you this is very expensive vinyl....the underlayment has to be finished smooth...all the screw holes have to be filled and the wood is laid in planks like a wood floor. Architect wanted us to go with wood as he said he could get it for 1/2 the price, but being our retirement home and wanting to minimize maintenance, we wanted the durability of vinyl. Even now he admits it looks good.

When we were looking at homes, a family graciously invited us to see theirs. Though I had stamped the snow off my shoes, when I walked on their beautiful brazilian cherry floors, a few drops of snow hit the floor and the home owner immediately ran to the kitchen to get a towel and mop it up! We certainly didn't want to live that way!

There are probably other manufacturers now that offer similar quality at perhaps lower price...but it would be worth a look.

We put in sheet marmoleum with cork underneath. We have a slab-on-grade foundation, and just having the marmoleum would not have provided me with the right amount of shock absorption to save my achy back and knees. Marmoleum will allow a certain amount of cork underlayment before they start squeeking about violation of their installation specifications (ie, won't honor their warranty), so we stayed within their rules.

We are very very happy with our floors, and we get a lot of compliments on them.

Thanks Karen. I just spoke with the folks at Forbo and learned about the cork under the tile option. This really sounds like the way to go.

Marmoleum offers such great design possibilities. Too bad that I can't really take advantage of them--I really need to keep this floor quiet. As someone on this board said, can't have too many clowns in the room!

Do you think that option was/is almost double the usual price? Cork under marmoleum sounds marvelous!

Sorry to hijack, NYCBluedevil...

But BalTra, I am so intrigued by the choices you showed in that linked post... Did you ever post pics of your kitchen? I found a post from December, I think, in which you said you were working on it, but couldn't find any since then... Not that the search here is very good, and I apologize if you did and I forgot!

nyc - was your discussion with the Forbo folks about cork under glue down or click tile?

rhome410 - since you are hijacking ;) what color is your click on your kitchen floor, it looks very nice in the pictures?

Thanks, Hags00... It's Serene Grey planks with either Barbados square tiles. I don't see Serene Grey in the Click options any more, but Eternity might be close? I haven't seen it in person, so can't tell for sure.

Hags00

He didn't specify whether the cork was to be used below the glue down or the click. I am not too sure I understand the difference but he told me that because I will have a clean slab, I would want the glue down tile.

We wanted a floor that felt nice, was quiet, and relatively durable (no dogs). Thought a lot about Marmoleum, but couldn't find the right color fit to cover a large area. We went with the Wicander Chestnut Lane cork floor; basically a thin layer of cork on bottom, MDF core, thin layer of cork on top with veneer. It lays down as planks, but as you can see you don't see the plank pattern as much as the linear pattern of the veneer. It really is not as red as the camera makes it look. We were going to run it into the laundry room and powder room, but a mini washer leak made us chicken out and go with vinyl there.

Just be VERY careful about the subfloor finish. It must be pristine for any glue-down product. (I know!)

I know vinyl flooring isn't popular right now, but I installed resilient vinyl flooring in my laundry room, and I love it. It is slightly cushioned, so it is really easy on your back, knees and feet. It is super easy to clean; mine is in a very high traffic mudroom/laundry room. It went down over sub-floor and I was surprised at how much quieter the washer/dryer are now.

Because of the way it was made, we did not have to glue it down, it was cut to fit but then tacked in place with quarter-round molding. It hasn't shifted at all in 2 years, and it will be easy to change out in the future when needed.

We had been looking and looking for flooring when we walked into yet another flooring store, saw this on their floor and knew instantly it was the one. In the page it is the Fiesta pattern, lower left corner.

Here is a link that might be useful: Stainmaster resilient flooring

Just sent you an email reply!

BalTra: I am also interested in your final choices and how things have turned out..

i too notice that many confuse lino with vinyl.

NYC - Interesting, I have a 30 year old concrete slab on grade foundation in Michigan, lots of freeze and thaw here. I am currently pulling up one layer of linoleum and one layer of parquet and all the associated glue off the slab. Yucky job.

I am putting down all floating floors, to get off the cold slab (cork under marmoleum would have some of that effect) and to prevent any problems from any shifting or cracking of the slab. In addition, I like the non-permanent nature. I can change my mind and change it in 5 or 6 years if it is not glued to my slab!!

In researching all the different floating floors, I discovered they all require a 6 mil plastic vapor barrier between the slab and the flooring to prevent moisture from the slab from reaching the flooring. Marmoleum Click has a pressed wood core with the marmoleum glued to one side and cork to the other side so my plan was to just go over the vapor barrier with Marmoleum Click.

I think the main advantage of glue down is the extra protection it provides you from water damage. I think glue down tile or sheet Marmoleum is quite bullet proof against water damage. The Click is less so because it has the pressed wood core like all floating type floors. I am just going to have to be careful not to let water sit and put something under the dog's water dishes.

Thanks for the nudge, claybabe and rhome.
I just posted my layout questions.
Pretty stuff questions to follow in a bit!

This thread makes me think one day I may put a layer of marmo over my cork! How comfy does that sound?