What does it mean to have a "Natural" look

We receive a lot of requests to give a floor a “natural look” or, at other times, to simply apply a “clear coat” of finish. In order to glean the desired look however, we’ll usually ask our clients to get a bit more specific and define exactly what they’d like to see. For example, does “natural” mean the way the wood looks when it’s raw? Or does it mean the color the wood looks with a coat of finish? Both are different. Does “clear coat” mean a coat of oil based finish? If so, that gives an dark amber hue whereas a “clear coat” of a water based finish is much lighter and looks totally different. Additionally, when using a water based system, you’ll need to choose one of their sealer colors. Here are those choices. Below are a few questions we may ask to help us get the best results and it may be helpful to being thinking about this well before the sanding starts.

Would you like the floor to look just like it does without any finish at all? If so, we’ll need to use a water based finish. most likely with Bona Naturalseal sealer color.

Would you like the floor to have an amber hue which is historically what floors looked like before water finishes became popular? If so we’ll need to use either oil based finish, or water based with Amberseal.

Do you want the floor to be lighter than it already its? If so we’ll most likely need to use water based finish.

Do you want to change the hue or make the floor much darker? We’d likely need to quote for a pigmented stain.

It’s very helpful for our teams to have these questions answered ahead of time so that we can make sure to schedule appropriately and have the right coatings on hand.