Laminate in the living room: views, selection, care and beautiful examples

The flooring in the living room should be durable, attractive, comfortable and easy to care for. Laminate meets all these characteristics. It is similar to a parquet, smart, but not to all accessible because of the high price. A diverse range of colors, types that differ in reliability, make the laminate a popular material for flooring in the living room.

This type of coating, like a laminate, is preferred by most Russian interior designers due to the fact that for a relatively low price high quality of the material, its reliability, ease of use and many other positive characteristics are guaranteed.

In the room, the laminate can be either a floor covering in a certain style, or attract attention with a separate accented spot.

In order for the laminate to look good immediately after installation and subsequently not to wear out, it is better to give your preference to those brands that have established themselves well in the market space. Laminate of poor quality, in addition to being fragile, also contains toxic substances and can seriously damage the health of family members.

Laminate has its positive and negative properties. The pros include:

• high operational qualities;
• good resistance to high temperatures and open flame;
• resistance to scratches and chips, shock resistance;
• environmental Safety;
• ease of care;
• acceptable price.

However, there are some disadvantages.

• Creak. Almost all consumers complain about it. This disadvantage can be easily eliminated if the cork backing is laid during installation.
• Intolerance to excess moisture. Water falling on the laminate will not cause him much harm, and if it gets into the intersutural cracks, this will adversely affect the properties of the coating. Therefore, when laying the laminate, the space between the joints should be treated with special solutions.
• The appearance of bubbles, which is caused by improper styling.
• The coating can only be laid on a flat floor.

Typically, in a standard setting, coatings with an outer layer look good, creating a likeness of natural materials, for example, piece parquet, tile, parquet.

When choosing a laminate for an apartment, a number of points must be taken into account.

The choice is determined by the activity of people in a particular room. Living room - this is the room where family members gather most often, so the floor covering should be durable and resistant to wear.

Of the 4 groups of laminate flooring, the 32nd class is considered the best option for the living room, which perfectly withstands daily household loads. But here one should not lose sight of the trademark of the material, because products belonging to the same group, but from different manufacturers, can vary in intensity of wear resistance.

For almost 20 years, European brands have not made the division of laminate into home and commercial, now all of it is divided into groups 31, 32, 33, 34. Laminate, belonging to the 31st group, is the most fragile, but it is suitable for the home.

The flooring may be moisture resistant, but this is not the main requirement.

Choosing a cover for floor design should based on a number of rules.

• For small rooms it is better to choose a material for decoration with a light shade. So, visually the room will seem larger. The interior with a dark coating on the floor will make the room even smaller.
• If you combine a laminate of two shades in a room, you can correctly divide the living room into zones. This technique is to the liking of many because of its simplicity and the fact that in the process accents are gently placed.
• The combination of laminate flooring with surrounding objects is not considered mandatory. There is enough general combination: warm or cold shades of the whole room should set the tone and flooring.
• When choosing a laminate, you need to pay attention not only to the image, but also to roughly figure out how it will look in a vast space. Wrong flooring will spoil the entire design in the room.

Laminate is widespread among people due to its extensive color scheme and texture. The color of the flooring also depends on the style of the living room. So, dark colors are characteristic for classics, light colors for ethnic and modern styles. Decoration of the living room can be issued in other stylistic directions.

• Country. The American ranch is characterized by a laminate of dark colors. Its design should resemble a plank floor.

• Swiss Chalet In order for the furnishings to determine the chalet style spirit as accurately as possible, it is necessary to choose a walnut or ash color coating.

• Provence. The rustic style is simple and natural. For finishing the floor, a material with an aging effect is well suited. For example, from whitewashed chamfered oak.

• Japanese style. This style involves bamboo or sisal floors, analogues of these materials can be found without problems in the colors of the laminate.

• Minimalism. The main feature of this style is restraint.A laminate with gray and white shades will look good here.

• High tech. This style is perfectly combined with a laminate of black and gray colors. It is not uncommon to use wenge coloring material.

Laminate will look perfect if it is correctly laid on the surface. Three standard layouts stand out: straight, diagonal, herringbone. There are times when a correctly selected floor covering completely transforms the look of the room.

It is important to remember that the styling method is not the last to influence the amount of material needed.

The direct way of laying has become widespread, because it is simple and anyone can master it. There are two subspecies of this method of laying: along and across the line of light. The first subspecies allows you to more beautifully lay the floor covering. Laying across the line of light will visually expand the room.

Diagonal styling is more expensive, but it is chosen more often. The diagonal orientation of the boards allows you to increase the size of the room and gives it a sense of spaciousness. It’s very difficult to lay the coating on the floor with your own hands in a diagonal way, it is better to contact specialists.

Herringbone flooring is not available to everyone, because not every material can be laid in this way. A special laminate that can be used for this method costs much more than usual.

One way to use a laminate is to use it for wall design. Usually, experts single out one wall in order to put a bright accent. The most common place to lay laminate flooring is the wall behind the TV. It accents the living room and serves as a great base for television pictures.

You can find out how to properly lay a laminate from the video below.