@temporary77 -thank you! We are really happy with the outcome. The refinishers were the ones who recommended using two coats of satin and a final coat of matte. Apparently the matte finish offers less protection from stains. In hindsight, I might have accepted stains as part of the deal—I really like the completely matte look.

The ORANGE you are seeing is the finish. The oil based polyurethanes are products that turn WHITE PAPER orange. It is called ambering. The red oak floors in the photo have been finished with an oil based finish. This is common practice but not currently attractive in today's 'white is best' flooring fashion. The issue I have with redoing the floors is this: The floors will loose 20 years of life if you sand/refinish them today. How do I know this? Because a site finished floor is supposed to offer 25 years of 'life'. A solid 3/4" hardwood (which I'm guessing this is) will offer 60 - 80 years of service (that's 3 sand/refinishes during it's lifetime). Each time you 'change' the colour (on a whim or due to current fashion) you cut down the life of your 'lifetime' floor. If you do this 3 times in 20 years (today, 10 years from now and then 20 years from now) you will have cut the life of your floor down to 40 years. That's half of it's natural life span. What I'm seeing as an 'issue' is the colour clash between the counter tops and the floors. The counters READ blue/gray, the walls read PERIWINKLE (which is a very difficult colour to live with/compliment) but the floors read cinnamon red/orange/brown. The biggest clash is in the kitchen with the wall colour and the counter tops are causing big issues. It would be cheaper, faster, easier to replace the counter tops. The wall colour is an issue for me (I'm not fond of periwinkle/lilac/blue). The rest of the house goes very well together. You have a traditional home with upscale traditional finishes/trim with a traditional wooden floor. The only issue I see is the colour clash on the walls/counters with the beautiful traditional wood coloured floors.

We went with natural red oak - we love the lighter flooring throughout our home - and a contrasting stained white oak cabinet (I think it’s with special walnut). Contrast is more restrained in person and cabs are darker than we envisioned - originally we were thinking less contrast - but we’re very happy with how it turned out! We also have a good amount of white in the kitchen.

Read the manufacturer's instruction if you have questions about product, and their adverse reactions if their instructions are not followed. https://www.bona.com/globalassets/catalogassets/bona-red-out-tds.pdf " Once completely dry, the floor can be stained as-is for a water-popped color saturation level, or it can be buffed with a 1” red pad to smooth out any grain raise." You do not apply poly straight over it.