L shaped hallway - oak floor

[Windows]

We were thinking of encaustic tile for the hallway, but now looking at oak floorboards like in the adjacent rooms for the L-shaped hallway.

The side going from the front door into the house is aligned with long boards as in the rooms, so that’s no problem. But as the hall turns 90° to the left, that part of the L will get a bunch of short boards going across the hall if we maintain the direction of the boards.

Will it look odd? Should boards change direction as we turn the corner? Does anyone have examples of wooden floored L shaped hallways?

Also considering whether to do some kind of border detail in a contrasting wood. Anyone seen examples of that they like?

It’s an Edwardian house. Hall is 2m wide (4.3 m long) in main section from front door and goes to 1m (2.8 m long) as it turns the corner.

 

[Doug71]

If you want the wood look maybe some parquet style would work well for an L shape?

 

[Mike G]

Oooh, I'd be very cautious. I'd suggest either doing everything at 45 degrees, or, as Doug suggests, using parquet. Or, best of all, sticking with your original plan.

 

[duke]

As Mike said be cautious, laying your hardwood floor in the same direction as your floor joists will eventually look bad in short time.
You end up with a pattern of tight joints for a few boards then larger gaps then tight joints. And the floor will have undulations.

 

[Windows]

I looked at pics of our old American house which had a similar turn from entrance hall to kitchen (although the corridor bit to the kitchen very short) and corridor & kitchen boards are 90° to direction in the hall. Presumably the joists changed direction though. I don’t know what was going on under the floor. That house’s hall had three darker wood stripes as a kind of border detail that was pretty nice.

Parquet is an interesting idea. Could treat the main bit of the hall as one section with long boards and do the side branch as parquet. The side branch leads to cloak room & utility whereas the main part has kitchen, dining, living room, and staircase coming off it, so a change in mood would be OK. Will continue side branch flooring into the tiny cloakroom.

New flooring will go over the top of the existing floorboards. Floors I’ve done so far here are secret nailed, but only through the boards at the edge. Still too soon to tell how that’ll hold up over time, but since I only have myself and my wife to please, I don’t have to worry about customer callbacks.

 

[duke]

Oh, do you mean over an existing hardwood floor or over a sub floor?

 

[Windows]

Over the original existing pine floorboards

 

[Cabinetman]

I’ve never seen this done but if the joint was at 45°, instead of having a mitred line how about stepping each board, in effect if the boards are 5” wide the boards would be progressively 5” longer as the joint went across the corner and the joint would have a zig zag appearance. So like a Herringbone but only where they join.
Ian

 

[Doug71]

My upstairs landing is L shaped with Oak floorboards, I kept all the boards running in the same direction so there are some short ones.

The short boards on my floor lead to the staircase and because they run the same direction as the stair treads I think it works in my situation but can see how it could look wrong in others.

 

[Windows]

Looks good. Perfectly normal. Maybe I’m just worrying about nothing. Might just keep the boards running in the same direction then. Thanks for the photos. Very helpful.

What finish did you use on your floor Doug?

 

[Doug71]

I used one of the Bona products (I think Bona Traffic), I did quite a few of the floors with it including staircase, landing and bathrooms. It's not cheap but lasted 16 years so far and not showing any signs of wear as yet.

 

[Cabinetman]

Nice little swerve around that corner there Doug, it just looks so much better with the corner taken off that room.