
Throughout history, the floors in palaces, castles and major public and private
buildings have been elaborate parquet designs, often quite large-scale, bordered
with equally intricate inlays (marquetry). We have niche mills that specialize in crafting reproductions of those wonderful
parquets and borders. The options are breathtaking. While the visuals are antique,
the performance is "space-age." We recently installed a copy of the
floor in the Louvre in Paris, made of hard-rock maple, finished to blend with
the client's cabinetry, protected with a 25-year finish in the factory. We have
many beautiful designs to choose from and you can use almost any specie available.
Borders and Insets: Borders range from a simple
inlay of contrasting wood to one with a special corner added, to very elaborate
borders, called marquetry. The most elegant borders, those with vines and buds
are carved with a laser. These pictures show some of our most popular borders.
It's never too late: When borders and insets are
installed, they are added after the field, or middle of the room, is complete.
So, if your foyer or your dining room is very nice, but a border around the oriental
rug in the dining room or a medallion under the chandelier in the foyer would
be stunning, it is never too late to add them, even years later.
Insets
and Medallions: Many people assume that the kind of craftsmanship necessary
to carve an intricate medallion in a wood floor is simply no longer available.
Or, if it were, it would be unaffordable. That is simply not true. In fact, the
use of lasers to cut through solid wood has made extremely intricate work more
affordable than ever. In the grapevine border pictured above and its matching
medallion, the grain of the wood runs in a different direction in each grape -
it's extraordinary!!
There are over a hundred medallions and insets to choose from. We can install
them in both new and old floors and the results are stunning.

We have an exclusive program featuring
5/16" thick natural cork tile. Cork is a unique natural product. It's very
resilient (soft) and an excellent thermal insulator (warm). It's also quiet -
often used as a sound and shock absorber under ceramic floors in high-rise buildings.
It was the flooring selected by the Library of Congress and The Mayo Clinic because
it is is so quiet and soft. Cork which is completely waterproof, has been used
as bottle stoppers and fishing floats since 2,500 B.C.!
Cork is environmentally friendly. It is harvested from the bark of the Cork
Oak tree, which is grown in commercial stands bordering the Mediterranean Sea. The
bark is harvested every nine years, without damage to the tree. (The process is
similar to shearing a sheep.)
We have been installing and finishing cork floors since we opened in 1973.
Today, we are offering natural or stained cork floors with a "no-wax"
acrylic urethaned finish - a natural floor, like hardwood, but softer and quieter.

We have
a wonderful artist who will apply any design you choose to add decoration to your
cork or hardwood floor. The Grapevine Border, Black & White Greek Key and
Blue and Yellow Diagonal Squares above are just the beginning. We have painted
floors. Large 3' x 3' samples mounted on our walls and a design portfolio help
you pick a pattern.
We can stylized a pattern from your wallpaper, fabric or even a piece of art.
And, or course, you can guide our artist as he designs one for you from your imagination.
It is all really very exciting and a lot of fun!
We will arrange for you to meet with our artist and we will make recommendations
for the type and color design you might like to use. But in the end, all the choices
are yours. We call the program "Naturally Yours."