Hello,

This is my first time posting to this site- and first time owning a home! I'm addicted to DIY tv and have already completed some small improvement projects in my new home. We had to rip out the large floor to ceiling fire place in our upstairs living room (it was very inefficient and the chimney was blocked- was a fire hazard) and found that the extra flooring the sellers left us was not sufficient to cover this new whole. The section is in the corner of the living room and is a hexagon like shape. The original flooring used in this room is a laminate product that is no longer manufactured (trust me I've checked EVERYWHERE!). So now what? I have a big corner with no flooring and no flooring to put there. I can't afford to replace the whole floor. I'm wondering if anyone has ideas on what I can put there that won't look awful?
Many thanks!

What about using hardwood flooring?

Can you not get unstained oak in the same width of board as your existing laminate? Any paint store will mix up a stain to match your existing laminate, and then just polyurethane it.

Posting a picture would get you some better ideas.
Your going to run into some issues, Laminite is thin, and where any two differant flooring types come into contact with laminite you need a transition stip so the flooring can move, if not it may just buckle.
In my house I installed a corner gas fire place, covered the floor and I now have back up heat if the power goes out.

big gap, huh? bummer.

two ways to go. one, decide that whatever hack you put in there, it's staying forever. two, it's a temporary fix until you can afford to fix the whole room's floor to match.

I'd decide on option two. whatever super-sale flooring is at the box store that is a close match, put it in for now. put a masking tape strip along both floor sections, and fill it with the closest match of caulk they've got. putty knife it level and pull the tape.

keep everybody and everything away from there for at least 12 hours. the caulk needs 24+ hours to set up for good, but after 12 hours or so an accidental slide of a magazine over the seam won't be a disaster. toss a rug over the seam after a couple days if it's noticeable.

now start saving up for replacement flooring. good engineered flooring goes on sale two or three times a year at lumber liquidators and most box stores for $2 to 2.50 a square foot, and would be an excellent choice. that installs DIY easy over tarpaper and a good subfloor using a 16 or 18 gauge air nailer. there are videos and tutorials on this website.

(( hint: past practica at LL is that right before New Years, when nobody is buying anything, they sell just about everything for cost. small quantities are priced cash and carry for very little. the sale may recur end of January, but for sure between Christmas and New Years. ymmv outside the contiguous 48 states, but the website also has those deals. you already know about shipping stuff up there... ))

and buy 15 to 20 percent more than you calculate that you need. that way, you should have something over one box of spare flooring when done. save it, forever, labelled with the room in which it was used. now if you have to make a repair someplace of a board or two, you can do it.

like tile, it seems packaged wood floors are made for 2 to 5 years, so it's incumbent on the smart homeowner to buy extra right away.

This message has been edited. Last edited by: swschrad,

it occurs to me also that joecaption has a good option three... slate-ish tile in the octagon for fire resistance, and a unit fireplace using type II stovepipe correctly installed. run an external smokestack, and you're fixed up.

Thanks to all of you for the ideas. My head is spinning at this point but I wonder what you think about rotating the gap- over to the front door entrance and then just using some tile or stone as a "landing" of sorts? The floor is floating, so I think I can disassemble it and rotate the gap over to where it makes more sense- like at the front door. All that snow and outside mess would likely damage this flooring anyway- so maybe if I can cover with something that is more resistant that might work. Has anyone ever done anything like that?

I'm going to start saving for new flooring as well.

You guys are life-savers!

That is exactly what I was going to suggest. It is a lot of work however. Is there flooring in any closet you could use? A landing sounds like a great idea.

What good would that do? It's laminite, it needs to be locked to stay in place and with the flooring cut at an angle that's not going to happen.