The article discusses the advantages and disadvantages of artistic parquet, its main types and breeds from which the dies are made. How to install flooring and create decorative patterns. Artistic parquet is a type of flooring with patterns obtained using planks of various sizes from several types of wood, differing in color and geometric shapes. We will talk about the variety of artistic floors and the principles of their creation in this article.
Advantages and disadvantages of artistic parquet
The coating has several advantages over conventional parquet:
- The user is given the opportunity to create an original floor that forms an individual style in the room.
- Artistic parquet does not need additional decorative elements. It can be compared to a real work of art.
- The floor has a long service life thanks to the use of hardwoods. For a long time, it does not lose its attractiveness.
- The coating has high environmental safety due to the use of natural wood.
- The porous structure of wooden specimens retains heat well in the room and has heat insulating properties.
- Artistic parquet is not demanding in maintenance.
- Multiple grinding of elements is allowed.
Among the disadvantages of this type of coating, one can single out low resistance to mechanical stress, high cost of material and installation work. Floor laying is accompanied by increased dust formation and noise.
The main varieties of art parquet
Decorative styling is a complex and painstaking work that is very valuable. Parquet is considered artistic if the following requirements are met:
- The floor covering consists of dies of different types of wood, different in color, size and shape. When creating a picture, sometimes up to 60 types of wood are used.
- The flooring has a pattern that echoes the overall environment in the room.
There are 2 types of art parquet:
- Piece … With its help, geometric patterns are created. All elements are made of the same size up to 50 cm long, 4-7.5 cm wide, 1, 5-2, 2 cm thick. They are connected with thorn-groove locks. Samples are made with rustic, tangential, radial and transverse sections of the log, therefore they differ in the fiber pattern. Most often, dies obtained by a cross cut are bought for decoration. Also on sale there is a massive parquet board, which is made in large quantities, so it is relatively inexpensive.
- Palace … Differs in the most complex drawings, which are assembled from elements of different sizes and shapes, like a mosaic. It is produced in sections with dimensions 60x60x4 cm, 40x40x4 cm and 40x40 22 cm. Each board consists of two layers. The bottom (base) is made of pine. The top layer is formed by pieces of wood that create a pattern. The slats of the section are connected to each other with “thorn-groove” locks.
Choosing the breed of artistic parquet
Dies are made from different types of trees, each of which has its own characteristics. To make the artistic parquet look harmonious in the interior of the room, take into account the characteristics of the material from which the boards are made:
- Oak parquet … It is considered a classic flooring. Dies made from it are hard, poorly absorb moisture. There is a beautiful pattern of various color shades on the surface, but over time the wood darkens. Samples with a normal drying time are considered to be of higher quality, the accelerated version is not suitable. Oak parquet is a versatile floor covering that can be installed in any room.
- Beech … Has the same hardness as oak, but the color is softer, with a yellowish or reddish tint. It requires adherence to special operating conditions, otherwise the strips will bend.
- Maple … Hardness is not inferior to oak. Has a white color, which turns yellow after a while. Experienced craftsmen recommend buying materials only with a normal drying time, because after the abbreviated procedure, the strips are deformed.
- Pine … Differs in softness, boards are quickly damaged by sharp female heels.
- Cherry … Has a brown color with a shade of pink, darkens over time. The material is not hard, but popular for its easy processing. It is often laid in the nursery.
When choosing wood for parquet, take into account the possibility of changing the color of the material after processing. Such combinations of wood look good on the floor: maple and walnut; beech and stained oak; Karelian birch and stained maple, etc. For tricolor floors the following combinations are recommended: oak, maple and ebony; walnut, maple, rosewood.
Experienced craftsmen recommend buying products from such wood, which has optimal characteristics for the area.
Parquet floor decoration
Decorative flooring can be created in different style solutions that are selected according to the interior of the room:
- Classic style … This parquet is suitable for all types of premises. It is distinguished by the presence of patterns of strict symmetry, created by straight lines. The images are simple, often borrowed from Greek or Roman heritage (for example, pictures of eagles or dolphins). The style is characterized by the use of materials from trees with red, black and pink tones, such as ash or maple. The color of the floor is chosen depending on the wall cladding.
- Art style … The coating is liked by people who prefer calm shades.
- Modern style … Can be immediately identified by flowing, curved lines, asymmetrical floral arrangements and feminine figures in loose-fitting clothes. Lilac or violet shades of wood, which are characteristic of amarat wood dies.
- Drawings with traditional national attributes … They are created from contrasting colors - black, white, blue-violet shades.
It happens that the floor looks different in the store and at home. It all depends on the size of the room, lighting and general conditions. For large rooms, a covering with a large pattern will add solemnity and splendor. Huge pictures of vegetation or made in the avant-garde style look good.
In small rooms, make patterns in the form of clear shapes and lines, the background should be light. Parquet in dark colors can only be installed in spacious rooms. Ornaments in the national style are created in contrasting shades.
Art parquet laying technology
When installing artistic parquet, it is necessary to take into account many factors that affect the appearance of the coating and the service life.
Checking the quality of the manufacture of dies
To obtain high quality artistic parquet, it is necessary to carefully select the elements of the coating. In doing so, it is recommended to adhere to our tips:
- Control the width, length and thickness of the elements, the indicators should be the same on all samples. Make sure the front of each plank is straight and the corners are straight. If these conditions are not met, defects will have to be eliminated by deep grinding, possibly up to 1 mm deep. Such a serious revision at the stage of installing the flooring reduces the thickness of the die and the service life of the floor, because the permissible thickness of material removal should not exceed 0.2 mm at a time.
- There should be no knots, chips or cracks on the front side of the blanks.
- Whenever possible, buy planks with the maximum thickness of the top layer, which will increase the number of sanding of the parquet during the renovation.
- The moisture content of the boards should be 9-11%.
- Check the workmanship of the grooves and tenons. To do this, fold a square from the boards. If the figure has angles of 90 degrees, and there are no gaps between the elements, the locks are made with high quality.
- Large dies have poor elasticity and can bulge and warp on uneven surfaces. Long samples on the back side must necessarily have grooves about half the thickness of the material, which make the product more flexible.
- The presence of grinding and polishing significantly saves time for finishing, but varnishing is not always profitable. Installation work is accompanied by leveling and fitting the surface in one plane, and the varnish layer will be broken.
- Sort the samples by cutting method. The strongest planks are obtained by sawing logs lengthwise. They can be easily identified by the straight lines on the front and the solid color of the plank.
- Drying of pieces of wood can be performed using microwave, hot air, vacuum. The latter is the preferred method. The parquet is placed in a vacuum chamber with a temperature of 52 to 70 degrees. With such a sparing option, internal stresses do not appear inside the material, therefore, when the environmental parameters change, the dimensions of the dies will change slightly.
Installation instructions for art parquet
Installation work is performed after finishing walls and ceilings and final fixing of cables and pipelines. During the procedure, the room should be kept at a temperature of + 18-23 degrees. Air humidity should be within 35-60%, floor humidity - no more than 5%, residual wall humidity - no more than 6%.
Laying is performed in a specific sequence:
- Base waterproofing;
- Leveling with a cement screed;
- Surface priming;
- Fastening plywood to cement screed or joists;
- Artistic parquet laying in accordance with the chosen style;
- Filling the flooring;
- Surface priming for varnish;
- Floor covering with varnish.
If the flooring technology is not followed, problems may arise - a creak will appear, the floorboards will dry out or fall off.
Creation of decorative drawings of art parquet
To obtain a coating with a complex color pattern, planks from different types of wood are used. Simple images are created from monochromatic planks, placing them at different angles to each other.
A homogeneous coating is often made from oak, which has a pronounced structure, which is good from an aesthetic point of view. This type of flooring is more durable than multi-plank flooring. Images are laid out in the form of ornaments, cubes, braids, etc.
The most common patterns of single-breed parquets are three images:
- Herringbone - used in classic designs.
- Deck - the planks are arranged longitudinally, suitable for all types of interiors.
- Vietnamese - an interweaving of transverse and longitudinal planks.
There are several typical parquet elements that can be assembled from single-breed and multi-breed pieces of wood. The modular floor is assembled from square panels; for connection, thorn-and-groove locks are used. Each section is made from separate dies. The dimensions of the product are selected according to the design of the floor. When determining the dimensions of the sections, it is necessary to leave gaps of 10-12 mm between the lumber and the wall.
When installing the modules, a layer of glue is applied to the plywood, on which the sections are placed. After checking the location, they are fastened with special nails. Some boards are made with embedded dowels. During installation, they are fastened with nails, which are hammered into the milling from the side of the free ends. Then the grooves are closed with dowels. There are 2 slats for each section.
To create a "rosette", dies made of several types of wood are used. The elements have different colors, so they can be used to create complex patterns, usually in the form of an ornament. The coating looks good in spacious rooms. It is considered the most difficult of wood flooring. The "rosette" usually has a round shape, its dimensions are limited by the size of the room. It is not recommended to create too small, such coatings look unpresentable.
Installation of the "socket" is carried out as follows:
- For the procedure, you will need the simplest circular device. To make a tool, you need a rail, at one end of which a nail is driven in, at the other end, a pencil is fixed. With its help, a circle is applied to the floor.
- The inner space of the circle is filled with planks in such a way that the edges of the elements extend slightly outside the circle.
- Draw another circle on top.
- Mark the position of the planks inside the circle, dismantle them.
- Cut off the outermost planks according to the mark.
- Apply a layer of glue to the base and smooth it out with a notched trowel. Also lubricate the ends of the dies with the composition.
- Place the boards inside the circle according to the markings and press down with a weight while the glue hardens. In the first hours, move the load on the parquet floor.
"Border" is a decorative element that can be used alone or in combination with other patterns of artistic parquet. Often performed in the form of a geometric ornament for floor zoning.
Installation of curbs is performed in the following sequence:
- On the base, at the location of the borders, draw a line.
- Place the planks on the floor with a slight overlap of the mark.
- After the glue dries, cut the edges of the planks.
- In places of the cut, clean the surface from dust and dirt.
- Glue the border back to back to the base parquet.
- Fix the decorative element in addition to the base with nails, hammering them in from the free side.
- Place a frieze between the decor and the wall, providing a 10 mm gap along the wall.
To lay the planks, adhering to the style you like, several methods are used, the most popular of them are:
- Marquetry … The main method of installing colored parquets. The pattern is created from individual planks to the full depth of the flooring. The work resembles assembling a large mosaic.
- Intarsia … Decorative products from other types of wood are introduced into the finished floor.
- Inlay … During installation, together with wooden elements, copper, aluminum and other non-wooden parts are used.
Watch the video about the installation of artistic parquet:
Nowadays, it is rare for anyone to make coating elements on their own. On the construction markets there are ready-made samples that allow you to assemble art parquet with your own hands. The flooring, laid in compliance with all assembly rules, will delight the owners with beauty and grace for many years.
