HOME STYLE / Kitchen Floors : Kitchen Floors Move Beyond a Checkered Past

Kitchen floors take quite a beating: hot sauces flying, juices spilling and utensils tumbling. Whether remodeling an old kitchen or designing a new one, there are materials to suit tastes as different as Victorian and postmodern and yet still stand up to the daily trauma that kitchen floors sustain.

Most North County homes have concrete subfloors, which will accept just about any type of new flooring except solid wood planking, which requires a wood subfloor.

Before re-flooring, consider the overall choice of floor materials throughout your house.

“I believe in the fewest materials,” says architect J. Michael Winfield, a principal at Architura in Solana Beach. “This will give a home aesthetic consistency. It helps unite the spaces. If you can distill it down to two flooring materials in your house instead of five, you’ll also save money. It costs less per square foot to hire a subcontractor for a large job than a small one.”

There is a wide price range in materials, with sheet vinyl starting at around $1.50 per square foot installed, on up to ceramic tile ($5 to $10 a foot), wood ($8 to $10 a foot) and slate ($9 to $15 a foot). The average kitchen contains only 70 to 135 square feet of floor space. So, in many cases a new floor can be installed for less than $1,000.

For warmth and richness, many area homeowners have turned to wood, according to Judy Wells, owner of Classic Floors in Vista. Previously overlooked because of the damage moisture can cause, wood kitchen floors have become increasingly popular with the development of durable, factory-applied urethane finishes.

“They are low-maintenance, and wood floors increase the value of your home, where vinyl floors only maintain the value,” Wells says. Oak is most common, but maple, pecan and birch are popular alternatives.

Name-brand wood floors such as Mannington are tongue-and-groove laminated strips, glued to concrete subfloors.

There is an advantage to using solid wood floors, even though they require a wood subfloor: They can be sanded and refinished, whereas the top layer of a laminated wood floor is often too thin for sanding.

Slate may seem like an exotic choice for a kitchen floor, but it is increasingly being used in North County homes, according to San Diego kitchen designer Pamela Smith. Slate, quarried from around the world, comes in an array of colors and can be durable if properly sealed.

For practicality, especially in households with children, vinyl is tough to beat. Patterns range from simulated brick or hardwood to pastel-hued flecks, and vinyl can last 15 to 20 years or longer with proper care.

Among four main American manufacturers of vinyl flooring, Mannington and Armstrong are the largest. Their floors aren’t the least expensive, but they are of consistent quality and come with warranties against such damage as indentations.

Vinyl floors should be cleaned only as recommended by manufacturers, cautions Peggy Lewis, a staff interior designer at Artistic Floors and Interiors in Encinitas. A few cleanings with abrasive household cleansers can ruin vinyl.

Instead, use a special floor-cleaning product, a water-ammonia solution or window cleaning fluid.

Do-it-yourselfers who want to use vinyl should consider 12-inch vinyl tiles, easier to install than wide swaths of sheet vinyl. Vinyl tiles come in three varieties: low cost vinyl composition tiles, such as the ones commonly used on supermarket floors ($.70 to $2 per square foot without installation); composition tiles with a no-wax finish ($1.50 to $3 a foot); and solid vinyl tiles, used for both residential and commercial applications.

Most are 12-inch squares. Lewis recommends the no-wax tiles for do-it-yourselfers. Many come with peel-off, self-adhesive backings.

Ceramic tiles are the other option for kitchen floors, usually 8-inch or 12-inch squares. These cost about twice as much as vinyl, but many people like the crisp, hand-crafted appearance of tiles and grout joints.

According to Wells of Classic Floors, ceramic tile is now the second most popular choice among North County residents for kitchen floors, behind wood and in front of vinyl.

“These are the lowest maintenance floors money can buy,” Wells says of ceramic tile. “There is almost nothing you can do that can damage them. They never wear out or fade, and there’s no way you can crack them, except with a sledgehammer.”

But there is a drawback to ceramic tile.

“I’ve had a lot of people complain about tile floors being hard on the feet,” Winfield said. “They end up putting some kind of throw rug down. Big puffy Mexican pavers seem to be particularly troublesome.”

Most flooring outlets are prepared to help do-it-yourselfers or to arrange installation.

“I’ll hold their hand and tell them how to do the job from beginning to end,” says Wells. “I’ll go to their house and take a look, for free. I can sell the best material in the world, but if it’s not installed properly, I’m wasting my time.”