Wide plank and stairs · Guildford

Oak plank upstairs, and the stairs finished to match

VitaStyle Pioneer Oak XL Plank, 190 mm wide, Select Grade in colour #114 Spiced Oak, supplied and fitted across the first floor and the top floor of Katy W's house in Guildford, through the builder: 195 m², glued down, in March. The staircase was already built; in July we sanded and oiled both flights to match, with colour and finishing oils from VitaStyle.

By Altin
The stairs →The base
The finished oak staircase from the landing: round-ended bottom step, square spindles and newels, with the plank floor running along the landing
July · the stairs finished · The upper flight from the first-floor landing
Project
Katy WGuildford · with the builder
Floor
VitaStyle Pioneer Oak XL PlankSelect Grade · #114 Spiced Oak · 190 mm, random lengths 600–1900 mm · 15 mm, 4 mm oak wear layer · oiled
Area
195 m² fittedFirst floor and top floor
Base
Screed, underfloor heatingWakol PU280 liquid DPM
Fixing
Fully bondedBona R848 adhesive
From the top-floor hallway through the doorway into the master bedroom: the first run of plank glued down through the doorway, strapped, with unopened packs laid across it to weight the straps
March · fitting · From the hallway into the master bedroom: the first run glued, strapped and weighted with the packs overnight, before carrying on either side
The job

A clean oak, laid long.

We supplied and fitted 195 m² of VitaStyle Pioneer Oak XL Plank across the first floor and the top floor of Katy W's house in Guildford, through the builder. It's an engineered board, 190 mm wide and 15 mm thick with a 4 mm oak top layer, oiled at the factory, in random lengths from 600 to 1900 mm. The grade is Select and the colour is VitaStyle #114 Spiced Oak.

The photos from fitting show the first-floor landing round the stair opening, and the rooms on the top floor under the roof, with dormer windows and roof lights. The grade is clean, with few knots, and the boards run the length of each room.

The base

Sealed, then fully bonded.

The subfloor is screed with underfloor heating. It was sealed with Wakol PU280, a liquid damp-proof membrane (DPM) rolled on to stop moisture coming up into the wood and the adhesive. Its turquoise colour shows at the foot of the wall in the first photo below.

Every board is fully bonded: glued to the subfloor across its whole underside with Bona R848, a hard-elastic adhesive that holds the floor firmly while allowing for the wood's natural movement.

Round the stair opening
The plank laid up to the edge of the stair opening on the landing, full-height glazing beyond

The landing, with the oak nosing running the full length of the stair opening.

The oak nosing
The oak nosing along the edge of the stair opening, the plank running up to it, the staircase below under protection board

The oak nosing along the edge of the opening, with the staircase below still under its protection.

Along the landing
Looking down along the landing boards beside the stair opening

Along the landing, beside the opening.

Before: the untreated flight from below, the underside of every open tread and the string on show
Before · The undersides, untreated
The stairs

Two flights, finished by hand.

The staircase was already built when the floor went in, and it stayed under protection board until the house was ready for it. In July we sanded both flights: treads, risers, strings and nosings, including the undersides. The surfaces were water-popped, which means dampened to raise the grain, and then de-nibbed to cut the raised fibres back.

VitaStyle supplied the colour oil and the finishing oil for the stairs to match their floor, and the colour was checked against the floor on a sample of the stair oak first. The flights were finished with one coat of the colour oil worked into the timber and buffed, de-nibbed again once it had cured, and a coat of the finishing oil to seal it. The spindles, newel posts and handrails were sanded by hand and finished to match. With open risers the underside of every tread is on show from below, so the sanding and finishing went underneath as well as on top.

The finished flight from the side and below: string, open treads and spindles, oiled
After · The same timber oiled, from below
March to July

The floor first, the stairs last.

The plank went down round the stair opening in March, with the staircase wrapped. The stairs were finished in July, once the rest of the house had been through, in VitaStyle oils matched to the floor.

March: the landing laid in oak plank round the stair opening, the bare staircase below with its treads under yellow-labelled protection board and the newel wrapped
March · the landing laid, the staircase under protection

Before

The plank laid round the opening and up to the full-height glazing. The treads are covered and the newel post is wrapped, so the stairs come through the rest of the build unmarked.

July: the finished upper flight from the first-floor landing, the round-ended bottom step on the plank floor
July · the same landing, the stairs finished

After

The oiled stair timber next to the floor's own factory oil, both in VitaStyle finishes.

Before and after

Up to the gallery.

Before: straight up the untreated open-riser flight towards the gallery landing and full-height windows
Before the oils

Untreated

The stairs as built, before any colour went on.

After: looking up the stairwell past the finished handrail to the galleried landing and full-height windows
Colour-oiled and finished

Finished

The same stairwell after the colour oil and the finishing oil.

Before: the lower flight untreated, seen from the stone-floored hall, open risers and a round-ended bottom step
Before · the lower flight, from the hall
Close up on the quarter landing: the finished VitaStyle floor, the untreated newel and tread beside it, and a block of stair oak finished in the matching colour oil lying on the boards
Before · the untreated stair timber beside the finished floor, with the colour sample matched to it
Around the house

Upstairs.

A room on the top floor with dormer windows, the plank running the length of the room

A room on the top floor with dormer windows, just fitted.

The same room from the other end, the planks running towards the doorway, spacers in the gap at the walls and no skirting yet

The same room from the other end, before skirting.

The plank running from the landing through a doorway into the next room

From the landing into the next room.

The first-floor landing laid up to the full-height glazing, before skirting

The landing, up to the glazing.

Questions about this floor

Q&A

Can the floor go in before the stairs are finished?
Yes. Here the plank was laid round the stair opening in March while the staircase stayed under protection board, and the stairs were sanded and finished in July once the rest of the house was through.
Can you refinish an oak staircase to go with a new oak floor?
Yes. Here we sanded both flights, water-popped and de-nibbed them, then applied a colour oil and a finishing oil, both from VitaStyle and matched to the floor. The balustrade was sanded by hand and finished to match.
What goes under a glued-down wood floor on underfloor heating?
On this job the subfloor is screed with underfloor heating. It was sealed with Wakol PU280, a liquid damp-proof membrane (DPM), and the boards were fully bonded to it with Bona R848 adhesive.
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