hardwood with an area rug?

Hardwood with area rugs! We just bought a house with carpet in the bedrooms and we ripped it out and added hardwood. Easy to maintain and clean. I am also repainting and it is so easy to clean up any spills on the hardwood. I wouldn't want to try to clean up paint from a wall to wall carpet!

What they said! Can't go wrong with hardwoods and a rug with a great pad will be lovely and soft, too!

Ever see how much dust can accumulate on a bedroom hardwood floor, especially under a bed, in a really short amount of time? That would all be *yuck* landing in the carpet fibers...(which is why I never store anything under beds, ever!!) As stated above, hardwood = easier to clean.

I went through the same thing...
We were looking at Karastan carpet and hardwood would be approx $500 more. I liked the cream color of the carpet we had chosen and the comfort of it, but in the end decided to go with hardwood and do an area rug. Hardwood is not being installed for another month so I still have time to change my mind,lol. (we're in Ontario so do like the idea of carpet for a more cozy feel in the cold winter months)

Part of the reason too is that we will eventually get another puppy and accidents much easier to clean up on hardwood than carpet..

I am going to be the dissenter here. After sleeping in a northwest bedroom with hardwood floors for 16 years, my only request to DH is carpet under my feet in the morning. Whether it be carpet or hardwood, the vacuum will only get under that bed every other month (if lucky!). The look of hardwood and area rugs/carpets is beautiful and it will be in our great room and dining room.

Best of luck in your decision making.

We recently went through this decision ourselves. In the end we decided to pull up the carpet, and refinish the hardwood. We had to move out for 4 days, and the refinisher got rid of the old oragey-brown floors and got them to almost an exact match of our natural white washed red oak floors that we have in the rest of the house.

The refinishing actually cost less than carpeting--but when you factor in the hotel stay and all of the trouble moving every stick of furniture out of the 4 bedrooms, the cost was probably similar, but the trouble was much more intense. We even had to empty our closets!

I love the way it looks, but at the same time--it does seem noisier. Sounds now carry through the house and are not muffled at all. This can be a problem for a happily married couple with 3 kids....

(just sayin')

We do have some big area rugs with pads (like in our bedroom), but those can be pricey. Overall I am happy with the look of the hardwood and think it was a good investment for the house.

It's not cheaper if you put in hardwood and also buy area rugs to cover much of it. Also the dust factor remains if you have area rugs. Notwithstanding I prefer hardwood with area rugs but it does make cleaning more difficult. I do like that I can see all the dust under the beds and remove it. I have one bedroom out of 4 with carpet and just had it redone.

I think 'rules' should not come into this equation at all. Do what suits you.

Carpet in bedrooms.....and I am a bare floor kind of gal. But when you have hard surfaced floors in a bedroom the "woolies" just scoot under the bed...with carpet they stay where they land and can easily be vacuumed up.
Besides it's so nice under foot.
Linda C

We had carpet in our bedroom and ripped it out a couple years ago. I love my wood floor. I can see how much dust there is under the bed now and I am kind of appalled truthfully. At least when I do vacuum under there I can get it all. It just seems (and is) so much cleaner. You can always put a rug by the bed so that your feet come down on it.

I have hardwood floors but when we did the bedroom over, we had carpeting installed. I love it. I run the Rhumba every day and once a week my Rainbow vac. It's pure white carpeting and it's still immaculate after a year. It's just the two of us. I love the luxury of it. The rest of the house is hardwood floors with rugs.

We just bought hardwood for the bedroom but it has not been installed yet. We are ripping out the carpet. My husband didn't want it as he wanted something warm to put his feet on when he got out of bed on cold winter mornings. I won this battle but it took me awhile. I have to say that we were looking at a very good grade of carpet and it still cost double for the hardwood floor.

No carpet. I have mild seasonal allergies. Once I got hardwood floors, I was able to almost completely stop taking allergy meds, except for a brief period in the spring and fall. I'm allergic to dust mites and I suspect carpeting can harbor them.

If the floor feels cold, slippers can help, although I keep the house really cool at night (55 degrees) and I've never really felt that the floor was too cold on bare feet.

Dust on hardwood easily "blows" under the bed, but it doesn't when you have carpet.

I prefer carpet in the bedrooms. I like the look and love how it feels on the feet. Plus it helps with lowering the accoustics. :)

I do have a braided runner on top of the carpet, in the front of our bed. With winter coming it's really comfy!

Its just my wife and I (and a great dane) so I'm not too worried about feeling cold. I really like the smooth feeling of wood on my feet too. The pricing is literally within $100 for each room. I can't help but think hardwood is the better value since I think it has more of an impact when people initially walk through the house. I'm not planning on selling but you never know. I also think with the dog it may be easier to maintain.

If the hardwood was more money I'd pass on it. Since pricing is identical and the wood will cover the entire main floor (save the kitchen and foyer)I think it will be more uniform rather than have a bunch of different floor coverings.

Leaning towards the wood since I love a great value.

Here is a pic of the new wood in the great room.

Here is a pic of what the carpet looked like :-)

I prefer the look of hardwood anywhere in a home, but for a bedroom, I really like the warmth of carpeting. We have frieze carpeting in all of our bedrooms. While I have dust allergies, I have found that frequent vacuuming with a quality machine works well. Of course, I live in an area that has extremely cold winters.

Hardwood with seasonal rugs (off in summer, on in winter)
No w2w.

I have hard floors throughout the house but not in the bedrooms. I like the softer feel on my feet and it is not so cold. I also like the sound buffering. With 2 boys in the house, sound is a definite factor.
We run the Roomba around the house every day and know that under the beds are some of the cleanest parts of the house since they get no foot traffic yet get vacuumed daily.
In our kids' rooms, they can lay on the floor and be comfy with a padded carpet. We do not allow food or drinks in their rooms, other than water. The carpets stay nice looking and it just gives a softer look. I'd never go with carpet in the living spaces, but the bedrooms are a different zone and vibe.

We just moved from our house that had carpet in just the bedrooms. I cannot tell you how much dust was under those beds! It makes me shudder just thinking about it! And no matter how hard you try, you cannot get the dust from right up next to the baseboards where they meet the carpet. It's impossible...over time, it just stays and gets stuck under there.

Because of that, we're putting wood in our entire downstairs. However, the upstairs is the kids' area. When I asked them what they wanted for their rooms, they both answered, enthusiastically, "carpet!" They said it's softer. So I guess they'll end up with it upstairs. Ugh.

It's a lot easier to swipe a dry dust mop over a hard floor than to vacuum carpet...especially under a bed or dresser.

I agree it's personal preference and probably also depends on your climate. We have hardwood with an area rug and I had the same in my last house, too. I have always had carpet my whole life, so it's nice to have hardwood. It is easy to vacuum under the bed. I have an extra long attachment for the upright.

I would love a Roomba but the cats are freaked out enough by the vacuum.

I'm surprised that no one has brought up allergies. Any allergy sufferer will tell you that if you have indoor allergies, your doctor will tell you hardwood is a much healthier option since you can not only minimize the dust (what you see you can sweep up even under the bed), but that you will not have nearly the issues with pollens, dander, and/or mold that you have with carpeting. That said, after 10+ years of allergy shots my issues are a thing of the past and so I opt for hardwood with area rug below. But if they were ever to come back the first thing to go would be the area rug which can be easily removed.

We love the wood floors on our first floor and wouldn't change them out for carpet ever, but we also prefer to have carpet upstairs and love it just as much. I suffer from indoor allergies so we restrict our animals to the main level and that has helped to control added dust and fur issues.

We have beautiful wood flooring throughout our home. When we had the flooring refinished 5 1/2 yrs ago & had carpet pulled up from the 2nd floor I went through the pros/cons of hw in bedrooms. In the end we chose high quality wool & wool blend carpeting for the bedrooms.
Echoing what others have said about noise travel, acoustics, children, warmth under foot & a home that is >80yrs old (not high energy efficient) I don't regret doing it.
Love the look and feel of HW, but in the bedrooms carpet seemed to have the edge over HW

Good luck

I do think weather would be a factor as well in this decision. We have mild winters and hot summers of course, and we have wood laminate floors in most of the house besides the bedrooms. I hate them, and my next house will be all wood or even better tile, no carpet anywhere ever again. we have lots of pets and it's just part of the gig with pets, they will get sick unexpectedly and have accidents and having professionally carpet cleaning done regularly can sure add up.

I personally would prefer tile everywhere, not sure how priactical it would be, but I find that the wood floors are very very hard to keep clean, dust/fur free and even daily vaccuuming doesn't seem to be enough.

A thick nice quality area rug would be all I needed to keep my tootsies warm in the morning.

Ya'll know my preference is wood. I MIGHT think differently if I were up north and give in to carpet in the bedrooms. Maybe not though. I'm just not a fan. We've had carpeting in every house in at least some of the rooms, until this one. We started with carpet but now all wood (other than kitchen and baths).

We have a basement and insulated floors, so sound is not a problem for us. The basement/insulation also helps keep the floors from being too cold in the winter. As for dust bunnies, etc. a dust mop or vac attachment works under our bed. Also, there's a bed skirt so even if there are dust bunnies, they can't be seen. :-)

Really, I find wood floors easy to care for. I'm sure the color and finish (shine, matte, etc.) can make a difference.

tina

well as to the weather issue...in our home in alaska we ripped out the carpet everywhere (20 year old carpet is so gross by the way...even if you think you're clean) and have hardwood. I would never go back to w2w.

in washington we have w2w in many rooms in our victorian and it's all coming up eventually. I've gotten it out of four rooms and have...e gads too many to go but it's GOING! Carpets can be cleaned and removed as you wish...w2w never goes away and the dirt does build up. There's a reason that when you buy a house you get a "carpet allowence" (to change out someone elses carpet) and when you have wood it's written up as a bonus for value :)

I'm also a barefoot girl at home (you get that way in alaska...no one wears shoes inside) as is my son. He does not like the wall to wall here either (he's 6 and has strong opinions on decor). He likes his "fuzzy rugs" (sheepskins) so much better!

Valinsv, my DH does have allergies and much prefers the hardwood for that. One of the things that helped him decide on this house was that there was hardwood and then tile in the kitchens and baths.

I have hardwoods under my carpets and have been debating the same issue. We pulled up the carpet in the hallway and on the stairs and refinished the wood floors. They look beautiful. Now its time to do the bedrooms and I'm not sure. I've had hardwood in my bedroom before and it's just not cozy. It's pretty and area rugs help but it's not the same as carpet. For me, I think the look of hardwood in the hallway is enough of an updated look and I think I am going to replace the bedroom carpets with new carpets. My kids lay on the floor alot and carpets are just better for lazy days hanging out in your bedroom.

hardwood this time ,you have carpet for 15 years ,it is a chance to change another style .
and the most important, both you love .

This is the first house we've lived in with hardwood in our bedroom. Now I can easily SEE and CLEAN all the bunnies and dirt in the corners and along the baseboards.

When I lived where there was carpet, I'd go over it once a week with the vacuum and think it was clean. Now I know it wasn't!!!!!! UGH! It had to be absolutely filthy.

I hope to never, never have carpet again.