Hardwood Flooring in Granville, OH

Granville is a village of 5,946 people set among three hills, with Denison University on College Hill above it, and it has a stronger sense of its own architecture than anywhere else we work. The first house went up in 1801; St. Luke's Episcopal Church dates from 1837 and the Buxton Inn from 1812. When people here talk about what a floor should look like, they are usually talking about fitting in with that.

Which makes the material conversation a specific one. In a Greek Revival or period-influenced house, plank width and finish matter more than they do almost anywhere else. Very wide, heavily wire-brushed contemporary planks read as an anachronism in a room with original trim, where a narrower board in a lower-sheen finish sits comfortably. That is not a rule we would impose, but it is worth raising before an order goes in rather than after a floor is down.

Structurally, old houses here behave like old houses everywhere: plank subfloors, joists that have settled, and floors that are out of level by enough to affect what can be laid. Rigid-core products bridge dips rather than following them, so a floor that would be fine in a new build can go hollow underfoot in a village house. Either the deck gets leveled properly first or the product gets chosen to suit it, and both are legitimate — what is not legitimate is ignoring it and hoping.

Original hardwood turns up under carpet regularly in Granville, and we will tell you when it is worth keeping. Refinishing an original floor is not work we do, but knowing it is there is your decision to make, and covering something salvageable without mentioning it is not how we would want to be dealt with either.

Stairs are the other Granville constant. Older village staircases are steep, narrow and rarely square, with winders and returns that have to be scribed on site rather than estimated. We measure stairs individually for exactly this reason, and it is the single biggest variable between one Granville quote and another.

Denison brings rental property into the mix as well as family homes, and the sensible specification for a student let is not the specification for a house someone intends to retire in. We are happy to say which is which.