When installing flooring in your home you’ll want to also consider its insulating properties. No one wants to install a brand new floor just to find out that it’s freezing cold in the winter. However, properly insulating a new floor can really increase the cost of your product. Sometimes you’ll have to buy an expensive underlayment or install a radiant heating system. Well, we would like to introduce you to a flooring product that actually is self insulating. This product is called cork flooring.
Interestingly, while cork flooring insulates it’s also considered a green flooring product. That’s right, this isn’t like other flooring products that require chemicals and man-made materials to achieve certain specifications. Cork flooring is natural and made from the bark of the cork oak tree. The bark of the cork oak tree is actual cork and is harvested by removing a small layer of the bark (cork) from the trunk. This process leaves the tree unharmed and able to be harvested repeatedly in the future throughout its entire lifespan. So, not only do you get a green flooring material you don’t have to worry about any added toxic chemicals that may affect your health.
The process of explaining why cork flooring is a great insulator is quite simple. You just need to understand the actual cellular make up of cork material. If you took a microscope to the cork material you would find millions upon millions of honeycomb air filled cells. These cells provide many other benefits and we’ll mention them in a bit. These cells actually help keep the air neutral between the top and bottom and prevent rapid temperature differences like concert or hardwood. This cellular structure also makes cork very durable and quite comfortable; if you don’t believe us visit a showroom today and test it out.
Now, some people just won’t be into cork flooring, maybe they want to go with carpet or real hardwood flooring. Well, you’ll be glad to know cork still offers a solution. You can use cork as an underlayment and get the same insulating effects. However, we recommend using the actual flooring product made out of cork. It’s great for the environment and has many other useful benefits for your household. You’ll be surprised to know that cork actually resists mold, mildew, moisture and bacteria. This means you can install this floor in the kitchen, bathroom and basement. This is also a hypoallergenic flooring solution so if you have allergies this can be a godsend during allergy season.
We suggest you learn more about cork flooring by visiting some of the links below. It will help educate you more on this green flooring material and also provide some excellent pictures of this flooring used in different rooms throughout the household. We hope our insulation article on cork based floors was useful and we encourage you to read our other articles on floors made out of cork at the links below.