There was a time when people were sold the idea that carpet would add more value to their home than hardwoods. The FHA minimum property standards were changed to allow carpet, and large numbers of people decided to “upgrade” by covering their existing hardwood floors with wall to wall carpet. The installers would put hundreds of nails and staples into the wood floor to attach tack strip and pad, carelessly drag their knives across the floor to cut the carpet pads more quickly, then finally gouge the floor with poorly designed carpet stretchers. The beautiful wood floors had been relegated to subfloors and were mistreated accordingly.
Now, decades later, disillusioned with the promises and propaganda of carpet, homeowners are discovering hidden gems in their new homes and opting to uncover and restore them. This is one such story.
Handy homeowners will sometimes opt to save money by tackling some of the demo and prep work themselves. In this case the customer removed the carpet, pad, tack strip and staples from the floor and stairs, and also handled painting the base shoe prior to installation. Not everybody has the time or inclination, but for those who do I like to offer flexible pricing options.
Often when carpets come up there are stains scattered around, but in this case it appeared the previous owners did not have pets or house plants. This meant most of the damage was just from carelessness during previous renovation and carpet installation. Nail holes, gouges, and paint sprayed all over the floor and stairs.
Sometimes you get lucky and the carpet does a decent job of protecting the floor from decades of wear. Fir has a tendency to bruise from wear and discolor from different types of cuts or scratches, a record of the time spent on the floor giving it a certain type of character.
The carpet removal also revealed gaps between the baseboard and the floor, so the last step was to install base shoe to cover the gaps and tie everything together. After some final touch up painting the house will be restored to its rightful status: a testament to the elegance of old Seattle, a timeless gem on Queen Anne Hill.
