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All about Choosing White Oak Flooring + Oak Floor Inspiration

March 8, 2023 by Ashley Mayes 16 Comments

If you are considering white oak flooring for your home, you are in a great place. I’m sharing exactly what white oak floors we put in, the hardwood floor price and also, sharing lots of inspiration for white oak stain colors to choose from!

All about Choosing White Oak Flooring + Oak Floor Inspiration

Wood flooring backstory on how we picked our oak floors

Our town has a mill, called Vermillion. They mill red oak hardwood and white oak hardwood in 3″, 4″ and 5″ planks. Their oak floor options come unfinished; meaning that you have to have it installed, stained onsite and then have a clear coat put over that. The process for the install is much longer because of the dry times for the topcoats.

I had originally gone to Vermillion first and loved their oak hardwood flooring options, prices and just that they were local. I was scared off because of the extra work the unfinished flooring would be. Vermillion also sells pre-finished hardwood and engineered hardwood but everything I liked was way out of my budget. #storyofmylife

So, I got my samples from Vermillion, checked out other local flooring businesses and ordered samples from BuildDirect.  It all seemed overwhelming.  Money was tight on being able to do the main rooms that we wanted to do (1500 sq feet) and having it installed. So, we decided to wait. We DIY lots of things around here, but the flooring is just too much for us to tackle. We have a custom circular staircase in our entryway, which we knew would be a huge undertaking to create custom stair treads for, as well as two different circular trim pieces. So, this wasn’t going to be a DIY project for us. As usual though, I have found ways to save on it and will share those at the end!

So, fast forward a few years and we are ready to just get ‘er done.

I went back to looking at wood samples and considered red oak vs white oak options.  I ordered more samples (mainly from BuildDirect) and went back to the stores in our area (including Vermillion). Luke and I both love lighter wood flooring, similar to these:

Light wood floor
Image via Greige Design
white oak floor
Image via Greige Design

Choosing engineered or pre-finished wood floors

First off, here’s a great article on the pros/cons of wood flooring versus engineered floors.

If we went with pre-finished flooring (either engineered or hardwood) then we could have the installers do room by room. This would mean that we could move everything out of one room to the room next to it each day. This is much easier than having them install raw, milled flooring.

With unfinished flooring, you have to move everything out of the rooms that are having the flooring put in, all at the same time. This is because they have to do multiple coats of stain and poly and they are doing those all at the same time. Moving everything out (1500 sq feet) and up/down multiple sets of flooring seemed crazy. So, I was determined to find finished flooring (meaning, it could just be installed and then it would be good to go).

There’s lots of discussion on engineered and what a great product it is. Lots of people chimed in on Instagram saying they loved theirs and others chimed in saying to only go with hardwood because it can always be refinished. I think, in our neighborhood, it would be considered a negative to go with the engineered. I think it could be viewed as a cheaper product. Not that it is a cheaper product, but, where we live, I think people would expect hardwoods. Our area tends to favor simple and traditional.

After looking at inspiration and considering our budget and options, we decided to purchase our white oak hardwood floors from our local mill.

Choosing White Oak Flooring Plank Width and Character

We went back to the factory to determine what size of plank width we wanted and if we wanted “select”, “1”, or “2” wood. At this point, I had already decided that I wanted white oak hardwood flooring instead of red oak hardwood flooring.

Oak floor grades

Basically, the oak floors are graded from no variance in colors or knots to lots of variance (in colors and knots).

  • Select : Highest Grade with little to no variance in colors and knots.
  • 1 : Minimal knot sizing and variance color.
  • 2 : Larger knots and a range of colors in the wood.
Picking out natural oak hardwood
Showing red oak with difference variances

The mill wasn’t running white oak when we were there so this is red oak. On the left, you can see that there is almost no variance in colors (that’s a 1, common) and the right side shows variance (2, common).

I thought I’d want the 1, common but when I saw a few pieces laid out, I realized that it was too perfect. All my inspiration pieces showed variances. So, I went with a 2 common in 5″ planks.

Breakdown on Hardwood Floors Price

As a general rule of thumb, the larger the plank size, the higher the cost. For the 5″ unfinished white oak floors in the 2 common grade level, we paid $2.55 a square foot (in 2018).

Some of my samples that I collected ranged from $1.99-$12 per square foot so there’s a wide range in flooring costs.

For unfinished white oak hardwood, you can expect to pay $1.75-3.50 per square foot depending on width of the planks as well as character/knots that you want.

For finished white oak hardwood flooring, you can expect $5.00-$12.00 per square foot.

White Oak Hardwood Floors Cost to Install
Love our forest green living room color? Check out my favorite interior paint colors!

Hardwood Floors Cost to Install

In our area (the midwest), the cost is $1.75-$2 square foot for the oak hardwood floors install and then $2.00 per square foot for the staining and finishing.

Our quote was $4 square foot to lay the wood and finish it. That doesn’t include ripping up baseboards or old flooring.

**You can save yourself money by ripping up baseboards and old carpet yourself! Luke and I did it ourselves and it wasn’t that bad.

Flush-mount floor registers

A huge plus side for getting unfinished is that I was able to order flush-mount wood registers (for the floor vents), which I’d highly recommend doing! They really look great.

flush mount floor registers

Making Custom Curved Stairs

Another plus to going with unfinished wood flooring is that the curved wood stairs install is easier to match because you can use the same stain.

For our curved wood stairs (including the custom moulding, planks and finishing) the cost was $3,000. There’s a level of craftsmanship needed to work on custom pieces, so I can’t say I was surprised by the price.

Cost to Install Herringbone

I debated about installing herringbone wood floors in our library. The cost was about $560, which equals out to be about 30% more on your install price. I realized that I loved the look of herringbone when the wood flooring planks were 3″ but I didn’t love it with the 5″ wood planks. Since I was going with the 5″ wood planks, I decided to forgo the herringbone pattern.

Mid-Toned Oak Wood Stain
See this post on how to build a closet loft for more information on my son’s room!

Looking for a mid-tone stain

Stain changes the look of the flooring drastically! I originally thought that I didn’t want the warmth of the stain but didn’t like the color of the wood with just the poly over the top.

My installer tested out a few swatches in the bedroom and let me think about it for a while. I eventually decided on Weathered Oak stain by Minwax finished with an eggshell topcoat. Its the perfect honey-warm color that I just adore.

White oak hardwood in kitchen with dark cabinets

I wasn’t very far along with my kitchen renovation when I had the flooring installed. I’m happy to report that the white oak hardwood flooring with dark kitchen cabinets look good. I love the combo.

So, that’s the process that we went through when choosing white oak vs red oak, stain colors, etc. I wanted to share a few other examples for you in case you are looking for a white oak floor that looks slightly different than mine.

White Oak Flooring

Photo Credit: vermontplankflooring

Wide Plank

I think white oak hardwood floors look really nice in more modern environments with a super wide plank. This is a perfect example of a really light stain as well.

Photo Credit: drivenbydecor

Refinishing floors with Bona Natural Seal

This is a great post to check out if you hate the color of your already installed floors and want to see what refinishing looks like. Her installers weren't even sure at versus whether she had red oak vs white oak in her home. Anyways, it's a good, thorough post on white oak stain as well as the whole process of refinishing.

Photo Credit: jennakateathome

Provincial Stain

This is another example of an original white oak floor that has been refinished. This blog post shows why Provincial stain was chosed and why they liked it better than Jocobean or Dark Walnut.

Photo Credit: .megleonard

Natural White Oak Floor

This is another example of an oak hardwood flooring transofmration. I like this post a lot because she tested out a few stains on the floor and also showed a bunch of before/afters.

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Filed Under: Home Renovation Tagged With: floor, flooring

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Reader Interactions



Comments

  1. Charlote W

    March 31, 2016 at 8:55 am

    This is going to look amazing! I can’t wait to see it!

    Reply
  2. Christi Chambers

    April 6, 2016 at 9:24 am

    So exciting Ashley!!! Can’t wait to see how it turns out!!

    Reply
  3. floor sanding west auckland

    February 8, 2017 at 3:46 am

    If the wood is the same height, you may be able to do a flush saddle.  Or, a saddle may work better if you have saddles in the doorways (alternatively, a t-molding can be used as that has a much lower height threshold.). 

    Reply
  4. Angie

    March 26, 2019 at 10:03 am

    Is this a Swedish finish or the newer water based finish, like Bona?

    We are refinishing our white oak floors and had a Swedish finish 12 years ago. I am pretty sure we did a natural stain and at the time the color was a very slight yellow, similar to yours. We have red oak trim and doors and after 12 years our floors look identical to our trim. I never expected that! Anyway, we are having them refinished by the same company that installed them and they no longer do a Swedish finish; they do a water based finish. I love the look of those finishes but I know it will not really blend well with our existing trim so we will likely have to use a stain. Hopefully we can come up with a good combo of stain and finish so that I am a bit closer to the current look while still blending with the old…

    Reply
    • Ashley Mayes

      March 28, 2019 at 10:10 am

      It’s a water based finish. Just an off the shelf, water based minwax.

      Reply
      • Angie

        April 25, 2019 at 7:05 pm

        Thank you!

        Reply
  5. Kaleen Morris

    September 22, 2019 at 6:10 am

    Can you tell me where to find more information about the open wall shelves that you used? Thank you

    Reply
    • Ashley Mayes

      September 24, 2019 at 12:35 pm

      Hi Kaleen,

      All the information can be found: https://biggerthanthethreeofus.com/project-gallery/diy-open-shelving-kitchen-guide/

      Reply
  6. Ali Lewisy

    September 30, 2020 at 5:59 pm

    Hello! Did you end up filling the knots of the wood floor with wood filler or did you let the poly fill it ?

    Reply
    • Ashley Mayes

      October 6, 2020 at 1:25 pm

      Hi Ali,

      Yes, the installers did fill the big knots! They used wood filler.

      Reply
  7. Audra

    April 24, 2022 at 11:57 pm

    Unrelated but where is your light fixture from in that last fixture with the stairs and cactus. I love it and have had no luck finding online.

    Reply
    • Ashley Mayes

      April 25, 2022 at 7:51 am

      Hi, It was from CB2 but they no longer have it.

      Reply

Trackbacks

  1. The Creative Gallery :: 174 - Bigger Than the Three of Us says:
    April 3, 2016 at 8:01 pm

    […] Wood Flooring Decision […]

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  2. Kitchen Reveal with Dark Cabinets and Open Shelving - Bigger Than the Three of Us says:
    December 7, 2016 at 11:18 am

    […] Asbestos Removal and Drywall Install (all the details including cost) / DIY Spice Drawer Organizer / Wood Flooring Decision […]

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  3. Modern Travel Gallery in Hallway - Bigger Than the Three of Us says:
    September 26, 2017 at 1:00 am

    […] The space started to take shape last year after we got our hardwood flooring installed. I get asked about the color of our hardwoods quite a bit; so, if you are curious, you can check out my post on how we chose our hardwood flooring. […]

    Reply
  4. House Project List 2019 - Bigger Than the Three of Us says:
    January 16, 2019 at 2:36 pm

    […] we decided on our oak flooring a few years ago, we really couldn’t afford to add more rooms to what we were having […]

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