flooring for a basement apt- healthy, eco-friendly, not too expensive?

[emmaegbert]

Okay... I read the other thread on flooring. But my question is a little different, I guess.

We are getting ready to move into a small basement apartment in my parents' house. We are going to need new flooring in the back room and my dad just wants to do more carpet but I want to consider other things-- bamboo? Cork? Palm? reclaimed wood? clay tiles? I don't like carpet anyway, and new carpet is such an indoor air quality issue. And its a basement and I feel like carpet just invites a mold problem.

We will be 4 of us living in about 550sf. So, every space has to be multi-function. The room we are redoing will be the bedroom but also a play/work space.

Flooring is directly onto concrete slab... no subfloor... so I think that rules out a lot. Front room and the "office nook" have large clay tiles. My dad is a little resistant to doing more of that b/c he does the work himself and finds it fussy (of course we'll help but he's a very DIY guy).

And also: Their tenant just moved out Friday night and then we found a very minor bedbug infestation. Tenant claims he didn't know about it but there were some weird powders sprinkled around... anyway guy was a slob (like, a disgusting, dirty slob, seriously, we suspect he literally did not clean the bathtub once in 10 years) but to be safe we had the dog come... and the dog found bedbugs, though none of the exterminators saw any signs, we still decided to act immediately. Now its been sprayed by an exterminator who specializes in bedbugs and we're supposed to stay out of there for at least a week. Luckily apartment is vacant so we're all pretty hopeful that this can actually be solved. Of course I am not thrilled about either the bedbugs OR the chemicals.

And. Before exterminators came, my dad ripped up all the carpet, to be safe. So, now the floor is bare and I want to take the chance to do something else.

Can you suggest good resources to learn more and figure out sourcing? Seems from the little reading that I am doing so far, the problems with cheap bamboo flooring are that its not durable and it has formaldehyde... plus its all coming a super long distance from China so how eco-friendly is that??

[SleeplessMommy]

There are several factors to consider with sustainability - carbon footprint of the product, installed AND how long it will last. Most carpet is a FAIL on sustainability (footprint, durability), though the cost is low. Reclaimed wood is great, but the cost is high. There is recycled wool carpet available here: http://www.greenbuildingsupply.com/P...esttimeout=100 (and some other low VOC flooring choices)

If you are going to be there a long time, and cost is not much of a factor (small area is good!) I would go with an underfloor heating system (one example here) http://www.warmyourfloor.com/ plus a floor surface that you love the look of: bamboo, wood, linoleum, whatever. You can also check your local Habitat Re Use store for leftover flooring. Maybe you will get lucky!

Just fyi, I did IKEA flooring (low end) in one basement room. It looks great, though I would use a better quality of underlayment next time. In another basement room, I did stick-on linoleum at 58 cents per square foot. DIY installation on both.

[emmaegbert]

thanks Sleepless mommy

I think we're going to start by visiting a big local reclamation center just to see what they might have... seems like the most eco-friendly option

then I will also look at tile (domestically produced if I can find it! or at least from this continent) and recycled wool carpet (very reasonable $$ if I can find a local source so I don't have to pay shipping). thinking other options look a little pricey and also dicey for a basement, though you're right, since the room is only about 15x15 we're not talking a huge investment. I am going to offer my dad that we'll just pay for the flooring, whatever it is, so that I don't have to feel bad if I choose a slightly more expensive option. I just want to be careful that if I go with more $$, its something that will be durable and stand up to the moisture and the kids.

[JudiAU]

We colored and sealed our concrete subfloor in our apartment. It wasn't hard and is easy to do. A fancy contractor who say it after the fact was really impressed. It is great for the kids and easy clean up if not super easy on the knees, but I am the only one bothered by it.

I'd probably choose linoleum which is cheap and can be cool-looking. The current issue of Martha Stewart has a very interesting spread of DIY patterns for flor and linoleum.

[Jane]

My midwife office is in my basement. I am very happy with laminate flooring. I did one with an attached underlaymment (Costco, cheap) and it sounds great. It is made from sawdust and other industrial leavings so I felt it was a better choice than some. Real Lino was too expensive, and I do not want vinyl for a variety of reasons. My feet won't take tile - too hard. I'd love cork, but it was easier to lay the laminate than cork, and I was in a hurry.
I would seriously recomend a mid-tone floor. Go too light andyou'll be vacuuming or sweeping every second. Oak, orange, yellow, grey, tan, etc. Birch (in my previous house) was a dust magnet. White and black VCT tiles have been similar for friends. Stay with boring, IMO.

[sunnysandiegan]

We have gorgeous cork plank flooring directly on concrete slab with a simple heavy-weight plastic underlayment. Cork planks are good AT or ABOVE grade level. If your space is BELOW grade level, then the planks are not advisable.

Sorry, I gotta run, but look at more than one source for cork information. Apparently there is some incorrect info out there on the internet (like any other topic).

I agree with medium color flooring or you'll spend a lot of time cleaning it. Dark shows dust and lint; light shows dirt. Ours is a light walnut color and is just about perfect.

[Thyme Mama]

[emmaegbert]

cork sounds awesome to me but looked expensive. I am going to spend some time Monday calling the local supply places, maybe there are some odd lots or leftovers I could get... we have a relatively small space afterall. and I wonder if they make recycled WOOL carpet "tiles"? I actually want a wool area rug (or several) for the front room too, which is all clay tile, so I'll be looking into that as well.

Thanks for the mid-tone advice. makes a ton of sense to me!

My husband was talking about just sealing the concrete. Now that the carpet is up, I can see there is linoleum in there, and my dad says pulling that up can be a disposal problem.

Thanks for the input everyone.

[zoebird]

one option, though funny, is to find sustainably made, eco friendly ply wood. the wood would come from sustainable, farmed wood. and, there are some that are now being made without formaldahyde, so i would look specifically for those, but if you can't find one, you want one with a low emission of formaldehyde, which you can then just expose to sunlight for a number of days for most of it to leave the material before putting it in the home.

they might be a bit pricier--as far as plywood goes--but it's less expensive then many types of flooring that you might get.

you'll need a good vapor barrier as well as a good insulation--that would be my basic recommendation if you aren't doing under-floor heating which would be the best--and then you cut the ply wood into wide planks (you can have this done at the store). they will look like a wide planked, hard wood floor.

depending upon the outer veneer, you can either let the grain show or simply do a painted floor. a friend of mine did hers with a "liming wax" which basically gave it that bleached/limed look, but without the work of actually liming it. looked great, honestly. anyway, did that, and then did a good heavy, eco friendly, oil-based polyurethane treatments (multiple coats over a number of days) so that it would be hard-wearing.

you can do a quick internet search for information on using ply-wood for flooring--check out blogs for how-tos to get the general idea. most of them become painted floors. i think it looks really great, and it's quite economical even if you are going for the more expensive eco-plys, waxes, paints, and polys.

it's amazing what you can do with something basic like plywood.