MY LIL GREEN DRESS

Natural Cork Flooring

If you are planning on doing any remodeling this winter or spring, you’ve got to take a look at natural cork flooring. Heck, even if you aren’t planning on updating your flooring, you should at least look at it. This stuff is seriously cool.

In my humble opinion, cork is one of the MOST sustainable flooring choices out there. Not only is it made from totally recycled content, it has the additional benefits of:

~ Being healthy for the inhabitants of the homes using it
~ It has shock absorbing properties. Basically that means it’s easy to walk on and it’s good for people who have joint problems.
~ It has a great ability to dampen sound so it’s a wonderful choice for a second floor or for people who live in condos.
~ Cork flooring can help to reduce your heating bills. It provides insulation which will help to keep your home warm in the winter.

To truly understand the how natural cork flooring is made, you have to first understand the cork industry as a whole. I’ll try to make this as simple as possible.

For hundreds of year, tree bark has been harvested using a method that doesn’t harm the tree at all. Harvesters peel bark from trees every 9 years. Once the bark has been harvested, it’s sent to wine bottle stoppers manufacturers. Once the wine corks have been made, the cork flooring manufacturing companies take the post-industrial byproducts and create cork floors. So, natural cork flooring is double green!

Once the flooring manufacturers have the cork, they grind it into very small pieces. They are then coated with a non-toxic resin and made into planks or tiles that are used as flooring.

Another great, green property of cork flooring is that you can get it into all kinds of different shades and colors. The manufacturers aren’t using stains and dyes to create the different colors available, they simply bake the cork for different amounts of time to achieve different finishes.

If that’s not enough, cork is easy to install and take care of. The cost of natural cork flooring is about the same as hardwood or high-quality laminates. As long as you occasionally put a sealer on your floor, it will outlast most other types of flooring.

If there is any drawback to using cork, it’s that it is soft. Using furniture pads will help to protect your floor from damage.

If you are already using cork flooring, send us pictures of your application – we’d love to show them off!

Envirocork is a company that provides a wide range of cork flooring, here is an example of cork flooring that’s currently available on the market:

Cork Flooring Options