We asked our wood flooring pro followers on our Facebook and Instagram pages about the oldest wood floor they had ever worked on. Here is a sampling of their responses:
Nicholas Maxson
The best I’ve got is this one from 1860.
Keith Dalton
This bed and breakfast in Oxford, Md., was built in 1736.
Kent Chavis
Heart pine circa 1854.
Francisco Tavares
This is fruitwood in the landmark McIlrath-Lorey House in Randolph, N.J., built in 1735.
Wesley Elliott
We routinely sand and finish floors from the late 1600s to early 1700s. Sometimes we scrape and hand-sand. This floor in Pikeville, Pa., was a mix of white and red oak, ash and hickory.
Bradley Ripley
This is a historic farm house in Virginia. It has a mix of different widths of pine.
Barry Oliver
Built in 1903. The foundation was rocks mortared together.
Michael Tipon
I refinished the pine flooring in the gift shop at Railtown 1897 State Historic Park in Jamestown, Calif.
Jim Hyde
This 1706 home is the oldest home in Cape May County in New Jersey. It was a mix of heart pine, fir and white pine.
Daryn Stead
A 400-year-old water mill; it was unbelievably tough and that floor had never been touched. It still had the milling components visible in the hallway—amazing property.
Leonard A. Hall
Just last September: parquet built around 1720 that used to be in a very prestigious hotel named Hotel du Horne in Brussels, Belgium, where it remained until the hotel was demolished in 1905. The current parquet owner’s grandfather salvaged it for his country estate: Kasteel Groot-Bijgaarden, about 10 miles west of Brussels. You can’t find stuff like that here, which is why I go to Europe for Workcamp Parquet.
Obe Martell
This is the original pine floor in a historic home built in Bristol, Pa., in 1681.
