OK now, I am biased because I really wish our kitchen had red oak to match the rest of our house, but it doesn't. So my answer is always going to be to match your existing wood if at all possible, because that's what I want for myself. You may take that for what it's worth. [grin] (The reason I want it is that our kitchen is continuous with a den that has an oak floor -- the dividing wall was taken down years ago. Of course your situation might be completely different.)

In case you are interested in seeing new vs old oak, here is a picture of our original floor adjacent to a floor that was installed about 5 years ago. The new floor is slightly higher than the old. The old floor was refinished at the same time the new was laid (old had been under carpet). And I have posted this elsewhere on the forum, so apologies to anyone having to look at it twice.

New red oak to the left, old (1949) to the right.

We had existing white oak in the DR/LR/hallway, but not in the kitchen. We opened the wall between the kitchen and then-DR (now used as our LR) during the reno. We had thought to use a different wood species in the kitchen space, but our floor guy told us it would look better (flow better) if we used white oak in the kitchen as well. Our original floors are from 1967 or so. They were likely covered with carpeting for the first 30 years, and then re-finished prior to us purchasing the house in late 1998. They were refinished again in 2004 (we hated the finish used, so planned to have them sanded and refinished again along with the kitchen floor).

The floor guys removed about 10% of the old DR floor, and weaved in the new white oak floor boards. BTW, the grade, color, etc. for the new floor boards were chosen by the floor guy to match the old floors.

When the kitchen floor was first installed/finished, before the cabs, island, and LR furniture went it (think clear, empty floor space), if you stood in one corner of the then-DR and looked across the entire open space, you could just barely detect that the new floor looked a little fresher and brighter than the old (but newly refinished) floor. I am VERY detail oriented and notice a lot of the little things that others don't (blessing and curse!).

Honestly, the only reason I could even tell the difference (between old and new floors) is because I was looking for it (and doing so when the rooms were completely empty). They looked, and look (even more so 3 1/2 yrs later) very well-matched and blended. If they didn't, I'd see it, and notice it every day, and this is not the case.

My advice if you decide to try going the wood floor route, is find a good floor guy, ask if he can match your original red oak floors, and keep that in mind as a viable option.

Good luck!

We matched the old oak floors for the greatroom portion of our renovation. My DH did the install and stain and the color is really almost perfect (except sometimes when the light catches it). We were lucky, because he knew the wood and the stain the original owners used.

For the kitchen, we decided that we are going to tile (but are still wondering what the final color will be). This makes sense for our family, as the wear and tear of moving chairs as well as the possible water stains made me nervous. My SIL had a DW overflow and she had to replace her whole flooring, so I'm a bit timid. If you have a family that will be kinder to wood floors, I say go for it. I know for a fact you can at least match the color.

Thanks for all of the comments. We're going to explore looking at matching the oak floors -- but I'm not too hopeful. While I'm sure a skilled floor guy could match the color, I doubt they could easily match the overall look. (The old floors probably need to be refinished, but I'm not sure theres enough wood left to do a decent sanding/refinish on the whole thing. They look good now, but unless he could age the "new" floors, they'd probably stand out ... )

Today I discovered that you can actually get a nice warm amber colored slate. I'm going to go check a few tile stores next week to see if anything catches my eye.

1930's Spanish Revival SCREAMS for saltillo pavers. There are plenty of ones on the market today that come already sealed and are easier care than the old timey ones. But, I think it'd be a great nod to your home's heritage with the new transitional sounding kitchen.