White Oak: Getting to Know North America’s Favorite Hardwood Flooring

In 2022, the demand for white oak hardwood flooring increased to over 32%. With the rising popularity of hardwood flooring since the pandemic, many homeowners and remodelers are installing different hardwoods in their homes. While many hardwood species are becoming more popular in the market, nothing stands close to white oak’s popularity. A native hardwood specie in many places in North America, white oak is one of the domestic wood choices for hardwood floorings in the US. But what makes this hardwood a cut above the rest? Here are some of the reasons why white oak hardwood floors are everyone’s favorite home addition.

White Oak Is Durable and Stable

Oak hardwood flooring’s best-selling point is its durability. However, natural white oak tends to be more popular than the rest because of its hardness. Depending on the type of tree and its location, white oak planks can be sturdier, more durable, and more stable.

In the Janka Hardness Scale, white oak measures 1,360, proving itself to be the more durable type of oak in the market. The Janka scale is a tool used to measure the hardness of different wood species by the force level needed to embed a steel ball into the wood at a certain depth.

Quality white oak hardwood floors have tight growth rings, high heart content, and long lengths. These characteristics show that your hardwood came from the center of old and mature timbers of white oak. But shorter and narrower hardwood planks come from tree branches or younger, softer timbers. When these planks mix with matured white oak floorboards, they affect the overall performance and longevity of your flooring. Moreover, its fast discoloration can damage your flooring aesthetic.

Its Texture

In recent years, more people are choosing white oak due to the increasing number of textured floors available on the market. Solid white oak hardwood floors are widely known for their rich grain and light tones, making texture variety possible. It makes the natural white oak ideal for homeowners who want a distressed wood flooring design.

The most popular white oak textures nowadays are brushed wood and a footworn surface. Brushed white oak texture can make new hardwood flooring old or lived in for decades. Using this wood texture gives character and a sense of heritage to our floors at home.

Unlike pine hardwood, natural white oak is more resistant to wear and dents. Due to these, other textures of white oak are handmade. However, their quality and durability are unaffected.

The footworn surface is a flooring technique created by hand that makes soft, undulating waves on your floorboards. This texture helps your new hardwood flooring look slightly worn and centuries old. Homeowners opting for a subtler version of the footworn surface can use the timeworn texture. Although they follow the same crafting process, the undulations of these flooring textures are softer yet can still give hardwood floors an aged and timeless look.

The timeworn texture is best for people using wide hardwood planks. The hand-scraped edges make the look authentic, like centuries-old pine hardwood floors.

Variety of Colors

Many homeowners with hardwood flooring projects often find themselves in a bind when choosing the right color of stains to use on their floors. Although most people find this matter challenging, you don’t have to worry about color stains with white oak hardwood flooring.

Unlike other flooring options, you can choose what stain suits your aesthetic best because natural white oak takes it better than other hardwood species. By using quality stains and following the appropriate staining process, white oak hardwood floors can handle a variety of color choices.

There are three main color categories when staining white oak hardwood planks: light, medium, and dark wood. Light hardwood floors are this year’s trending flooring color. White oak floors often have natural or light-colored stains to keep their look organic. Light-colored floors are the top hardwood floorings in many east coast homes.

Medium-colored floors need a perfect balance between light and dark. To get this on a white oak hardwood floor, homeowners can use darker shades or apply them thinly so the natural color of the oak can blend with the stain. Because of their timeless and homey look, they’re the top color for hardwood flooring in Austin and other parts of Texas.

Dark hardwood floors use darker stains to give floorings a more elegant and luxurious feel while highlighting the grains of your white oak floorboards. While they create contrast in the home’s interior, footprints, dust, and scratches are more visible. Due to that, it requires more cleaning and maintenance from homeowners to keep the floors pristine and shiny.

Why People Love White Oak Hardwood Flooring

While more hardwood species are available in the market, white oak hardwood floors are still at the top of the flooring sales. Unlike other domestic hardwood, quality white oak provides a variety of colors and textures for homeowners to use. Moreover, oak wood planks are still more durable than most wood specie and last longer despite the wear and tear of time. Check out the best white oak wood planks with a professional from Kelly Hardwood Flooring today!