Home Guru: Wall-to-Wall is Trending Back, and its Grey, Grey, Grey

By Bill Primavera

More than 25 years ago, my friend John Carr was the first person I knew who built his own home. He was also the first who taught me that installing hardwood floors cost pretty much the same as installing subflooring and wall-to-wall carpeting.

Naturally, I thought, who would ever want carpeting when they could have hardwood flooring at the same price?

It seems that for the past three decades, everyone else has had the same preference, with the addition of an area rug here and there–or so I thought–until I visited my seller client. Redi-Cut Carpets of Port Chester, the largest floor surfacing store in Westchester, offers wall-to-wall carpeting, hardwood flooring and area rugs.

“Yes, actually, wall-to-wall carpeting is very much back,” said Michael Feldman, second generation owner of Redi-Cut, which is ensconced in a 5,500-square-foot space on Main Street next door to Tarry Market and Tarry Wine operated by Mario Batali and Joe Bastianich of television fame.

After having ripped out all of my wall-to-wall in two rooms, remembering that I had beautiful hardwood flooring underneath, now suddenly I’m ordering new carpeting because who knew it’s back?

“Yes, people have been into hardwood floors as a preference because they found them cleaner and anti-allergenic and didn’t collect dust, and certainly we sell wood floors and refinish them, but the carpet industry realized what was happening and responded to it,” Feldman said. “Now they make carpeting that is non-allergenic and guaranteed for life not to stain. It’s actually coated with Teflon.”

“Teflon? You, mean, like the stuff on frying pans?” I asked?

“Yes, like on frying pans,” Feldman responded.

“Son of a gun, that’s some protection,” I exclaimed.

It seems that this kind of technology has been available for three years. Feldman, who goes every year to a surface flooring convention in Las Vegas to keep abreast with what’s trending in carpeting, estimates that as much as 70 percent of his market prefers wall-to-wall carpeting over hardwood flooring. That came as a real surprise to me, that the long-term trend toward hardwood flooring has suddenly reversed itself.

Further, Feldman noted that the preference in neutral shades toward the warmer beiges had cooled markedly toward the greys.

“Grey is definitely the big choice today in both lighter and darker shades,” he said.

That pronouncement did not surprise me because I can see many benefits for choosing grey as a cooler shade that tends to make a room look larger and provides a better neutral background to allow other colors to “pop.”

When asked about the choice between wool and artificial fiber, Feldman said that those who seek the more expensive options will go for wool, which is the more luxurious, but is more difficult to keep clean and doesn’t last as long. “Tremendous improvements have been made with nylon, which can look very much like wool, doesn’t stain and is virtually indestructible, and yet look how soft the texture can feel,” he said while demonstrating with the soft pile from one of his samples.

The price range for purchasing wall-to-wall carpeting is as broad as the income range of the marketplace. Feldman’s more upscale clientele might spend $22 a square foot while the average purchaser, i.e., me, would spend from $6 to $ 8 per square foot.

Other technology advances include production plants having the capability of customizing carpeting colors to the customers’ specifications to match colors of upholstery or draperies.

So, now that I’ve stripped my floors bare to reveal the hardwood beneath, I’ve just ordered wall-to-wall to recover them and, you’ve got it, the color I’ve selected is a subtly patterned blueish grey.

If you want to update your wall-to-wall carpeting, the pro to guide you is Michael Feldman of Redi-Cut Flooring. He can be reached at his store, located at 173 N. Main St. in Port Chester, at  914-873-0811. The website is www.redicutny.com.

Bill Primavera is a Realtor® associated with William Raveis Real Estate and Founder of Primavera Public Relations, Inc., the longest running public relations agency in Westchester (www.PrimaveraPR.com), specializing in lifestyles, real estate and development. His real estate site is: www.PrimaveraRealEstate.com and his blog is: www.TheHomeGuru.com.  To engage the services of Bill Primavera and his team to market your home for sale, call 914-522-2076.