@katiejeane i am glad i came across your post of red oak flooring. i have been trying for months to get the color right and love your home and floor. I have some questions and hope you dont mind me asking. do you get a lot of natural light? What sun exposure do you have? id love to see the floor up close to see the background color and grain. would you mind posting a picture? what poly did you apply and what finish: extra matte or satin? hoping you did not water pop or pretreat the floor to get the red out since we are not doing those things. you still love it and have no regrets? i have tried every combination that i have resorted to non-mixed colors of special walnut, and provincial, and mixed of medium brown/rustic, chestnut/rustic and going to try your mix of medium brown/weathered. what were your runner ups. So afraid to pick wrong again (first pick i selected weathered oak and what a distaster - way to pink on red oak). yoir guidance and insight are welcome. looking to put this part of the project behind me.

The only way to REALLY tell the final look is to apply a single coat of poly over top the colour. An oil based or oil modified finish WILL ADD more colour....like yellow or orange. So far, the samples in your link show a lovely grey. The darker "left" side will be grayer. The lighter "right" side will be the colour that lets pink show through. That's the danger of using a gray over red oak. Gray is a mix of black and white. White over red oak shows pink. Therefore any gray (ahem...white based) will show some form of pink. The lighter the gray, the more WHITE in the mix. The more WHITE you have the more PINK will show through with red oak. So...the only way to REALLY see the pink would be to put down a coat of poly over the finish. That will add depth to the colour. And in those depths you will see pink. Especially the lighter gray. Remember: white on red oak = pink. The lighter the gray the more white you have in the mix = pink.

I wasn't correcting that. I was making sure you know that Bona Naturale needs to have a sealer underneath. I've seen others here claim it was used AS a sealer. Having the name Naturale is a bit confusing when Bona has a Naturalseal, and natural is a generic term for a wood floor finished clear. It looks like I was mistaken in that Naturalseal is between Nordicseal and Classicseal. I had Bonaseal (since changed names to Classicseal) and Bona urethane on my master bedroom White oak for many years. It's a nice background color but it isn't exactly warm or overly interesting. That can be a good or a bad thing. In my case, I wanted a background floor that didn't clash with anything, allowing me to decorate as I wished. Since you've seen the lightest option and the middle option, perhaps it would be smart to see the Intenseseal or Amberseal. OTOH, if you really like the Classicseal, maybe you should stop looking. It seems like things were easier to accomplish when there weren't so many options.

I am going thru the same thing right now! We already blended a bona stain and hated it so I am paying to re-sand! My contractor uses bona and duraseal ...here are some of my examples...the classic grey ( big area) is nice but looks purple sometimes...I kinda like your special walnut -classic grey combo....