As many homeowners prioritize natural beauty and ease of maintenance in their living spaces, hardwood floors have become a popular flooring option. And for many consumers, that means refinishing existing wood floors that need a little help to regain their original luster.

If you’re considering sprucing up your floors, you may want to pay close attention to the environmental impact of your plans. It’s important to factor in the processes and products that will optimize your family’s health and wellness instead of exposing them to potentially harmful chemicals.

Happily, today’s new hardwood floor refinishing systems and products offer better options for a safe and efficient process. Here are five steps you can take to ensure your floor project ends with a gloriously lustrous, durable, beautiful floor that won’t adversely affect the inhabitants of your home.

(1) Choose A Credible Contractor.

Shop around for a professional who understands how to work with the specific floors you’ve installed without introducing toxicity into your home environment. The best alternative may be a Bona Certified Craftsman® who’s been trained on how to revive, recoat and refinish wood floors of all kinds without using potentially harmful chemicals.

(2) Make A Joint Plan.

Instead of simply handing the entire project over to your contractor, work with him or her to create a refinishing plan that specifies how, when and where the work will take place and what kinds of products will be used. One way to make that easier is by using Bona’s Floor Visualizer, a new online tool that can help you visualize how different flooring choices will look in various rooms of your home.

(3) Go Dustless.

Insist that your contractor use a certified dust containment system that will eliminate virtually all floating dust particles from the floor sanding process. OSHA advises that airborne wood dust is carcinogenic, which can lead to respiratory issues or even cancer.

(4) Opt For a Waterborne Finish.

While some contractors offer less expensive options such as acid-cured varnishes, conversion varnishes, or “Swedish” finishes, those varieties contain high levels of volatile organic compounds (VOCs) that can adversely affect your home’s air quality. The formaldehyde in acid-cured finishes can agitate respiratory illnesses and/or cause nausea, dizziness, headaches and irritation of the eyes, nose, or throat. Another problem? Those harsh finishes can keep emitting problematic chemicals for up to 90 days as it cures.

In comparison, water-based finishes are lower in VOCs, emit minimal odor, dry much quicker, and are overall safer and more convenient for people, pets, and plants. Further, they’re durable, beautiful, and clear-drying on all kinds of hardwood floors.

(5) Know Best Practices for Maintenance.

Once your waterborne finish is cured, you can best maintain your new gorgeous wood floors by avoiding the use of vacuums, steam cleaners, vinegar-and-water solutions, oil soaps, paste waxes, furniture polishes, and other harsh cleaning products formulated for other surfaces. Instead, look for cleaning solutions like Bona’s Hardwood Floor Cleaning solutions that are developed for wood floors, are biodegradable, use plant-derived ingredients, and are Safer Choice certified.

With today’s technology, there’s no reason to settle for hardwood floor renovation techniques that are harmful to the environment and your home. Choose wisely when it comes to the health of your family. For more information on safe and environmentally sound care of your hardwood floors, visit US.Bona.com.

Foundation planting refers to the plants that directly border your home’s foundation. The right look can make your home more welcoming or even a tad more dramatic. Some people are born with a green thumb while others have a difficult time picturing what their home could be. Maybe you know what you like but aren’t certain what’s right for your home. For a few ideas that you may not have considered, consider the following twists on traditional foundation planting.

Skip The Structure

Foundational plantings sometimes look incredibly formal, forming stiff rows of color in front of the home. However, you may get better results if you have one or two focal-point plants around your home that you group colorful shrubs around. Azaleas, salvias, and spireas will all serve as excellent highlights for the main event.

Modern And Minimalist

As with a lot of things in life, less is more. Many contemporary homes will use just a few rush marches to get a little greenery in an otherwise stark environment. This style might not be great for a 4-bedroom Tudor, but it will look excellent on a sleek home with a high wall as a barrier. There are plenty of shrubs you can get, like pale rush, that don’t require a lot of maintenance. How’s that for simplifying things?

Wild And Wonderful

There’s no rule saying that your foundational plants can’t bring a touch of the wild to your home. There are plenty of plumes, grasses, and seeds that will bring the meadow from the forest to your home. Trim the foliage when winter comes along or leave it as is for a little more visual flair and texture (even when the rest of the neighborhood looks a touch barren.)

Drama In Tight Spaces

If you have a small patio or deck between your home and garage, then make it a lot more dramatic by giving the garage foundation and home the right plants. You might be surprised at how good larger plants (like elephant ears) look in such a tight space. Contrast greenery on one side with a different color on the other, such as dark purple or even bright orange. It may create a more inviting space to encourage people to use the deck more often.

A Different Take On Traditional

There’s nothing wrong with wanting the more traditional shrubs that tend to border a home, especially if that’s what you’re used to. Evergreens are usually the go-to for homeowners because they truly do look beautiful all year round. If you want a small twist, try breaking the greenery into different shapes (e.g., circles or geometrically correct squares.) Or use boxwoods (rectangular containers to hold a single specimen) to break up the shrubs and to add a little more color amongst all the dark green.

Pale Green And Silver

For a more Mediterranean look, consider using olive trees or muted rosemary shrubs to complement a stone home. The paler colors won’t draw a lot of attention, but they can make it appear more understated. You can think of this choice like using the minimalist style with just a little extra.

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If you dream about transforming your home on a budget, chances are you’ve considered new paint, area rugs, or window treatments. While these updates can refresh rooms without breaking the bank, there’s a crucial and often overlooked design element that can truly transform a room – lighting.

The good news is, improving lighting doesn’t necessarily require all new fixtures. Simply swapping from standard to LED lightbulbs can upgrade the ambience of your home with stylish features and energy-saving benefits that can have a dramatic impact on your energy bill – and the look and feel of your overall space.

Lighting can alter the appearance of paint, furnishings, and decor, becoming even more important as seasons change. As the days get shorter and darker, brighten up your home with an elevated, energy-efficient home basic: LED lightbulbs.

Here are a few bright ideas to revamp rooms using the power of the humble lightbulb:

1. Go LED For Cost Savings

Select LED bulbs reduce household energy costs over the course of their lifetime. An EcoSmart lightbulb saves $0.55-$2.65 on average per bulb over its 25,000-hour lifetime. New LED lightbulbs offer the latest innovation in lighting technology and are available in a wide assortment of wattage outputs, colors, base options, and shapes.

2. Consider Function

LEDs are directional light sources, enabling them to cast light and use energy more efficiently. When choosing your ideal lightbulb style, consider the room’s purpose. A kitchen needs to be bright to aid food preparation, but

your bedroom should be a restful, cozy oasis. For a living room, you may want to switch from a game-and-puzzle center with focused lighting to a darkened home theater for movie night.

• Kitchens need light to perform cooking tasks, as well as for entertaining. EcoSmart LED recessed and track lighting (BR) offer strong overhead illumination in enclosed fixtures.

• Bathrooms need effective lighting, plus decorative style. Globe-shaped LED lightbulbs emit light in every direction, making them ideal for mirror and pendant lights.

• Dining areas are a great place to show off decorative fixtures with candle bulbs. New, improved decorative bulbs feature a thinner, longer filament design – with options like fine bendy or horizontal – that combine authentic styles and 360-degree light output with low glare for high-quality lighting that doesn’t sacrifice style.

• Bedrooms or living areas where ambience is paramount offer endless creative possibilities. Vintage is a look that never truly goes out of style and EcoSmart “Edison” bulbs give a more “true vintage look,” along with the benefits of LED technology. EcoSmart offers a dimmable option for these bulbs too, so you can choose exactly how much light you want.

• Outdoor living spaces benefit from security lighting. Turn any fixture into a state-of-the-art security fixture with features like motion sensors, high output, and dusk-to-dawn. Look for lightbulbs compatible with floodlights, security, and landscape lighting (PAR).

3. Choose “Color Temperature” To Change The Mood

Today’s LED bulbs offer a wide variety of color temperatures, empowering you to make the room feel warmer and cozier, or cooler and crisper.

Contrary to what you may think, the hotter the light source (measured in Kelvins), the cooler the “color temperature,” so lights with temperatures at 5,000 or more Kelvins look brighter, crisper and more bluish. However, light temperatures around 2,500-3,000 Kelvins emit an amber, yellowish or orange tinge which makes rooms feel warmer and cozier.

“Like choosing paint in cool or warm colors, picking the right color temperature for lighting can really transform a space,” said Sarah Fishburne, Director of Trend and Design for The Home Depot. “You can emphasize warm tones like yellows, reds and oranges using ‘warm’ colored lighting, or you can make a room feel lighter, brighter, and airier by choosing ‘cool’ temperature lighting.”

Experiment with different bulbs and settings to see what works best with your room. For the ultimate color selection, try an EcoSmart lightbulb with 5 CCT (Correlated Color Temperature) that lets you customize the color of light using an integrated switch. Bulbs equipped with DuoBright technology empower you to adjust the color temperature and brightness with your existing dimmer switch to meet your preferences at any time – emitting 5,000 Kelvins (Daylight) at full brightness and slowly transitioning to 2,000 Kelvins (Sunset Glow) when dimmed.

Change Your Lightbulbs, Change The World

The other good news about swapping out lightbulbs? You’re helping the environment, too. On average, an enhanced EcoSmart LED bulb uses 85% less energy than a traditional incandescent lightbulb.

Learn more about EcoSmart lightbulbs available exclusively in-store at The Home Depot or online at HomeDepot.

When we find good articles that can help around the home, we like to share them with our clients. We hope you enjoyed this article on LED bulbs.

— Please remember us when you or someone you know is in need of a home inspection. A referral from you would be our greatest compliment.
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Events from the past year have all of us reconsidering what we want and need out of our homes. From work and play to wellness, our homes have become the epicenter of, well, everything – leading to an emergence of design trends focused on adapting to a new normal. The design experts at Wilsonart, a world-leading provider of engineered surfaces, have identified three new lifestyle trends that are affecting lasting design changes.

1. Back to Nature

It’s no secret that nature has the power to inspire, invigorate, restore and refresh. Research has shown that interacting with nature can offer mental health benefits, including decreasing stress and relieving anxiety. Likewise, incorporating elements of nature into the home has been proven to improve happiness and well-being.

Whether as a room’s canvas or a pop of color on an accent wall, paint is an easy and affordable way to bring nature’s beauty into the home with colors that evoke a sense of calm and serenity. “Dark blue hues reminiscent of water and the sky are trending, along with lush greens that infuse spaces with the fresh essence of grass and foliage,” says designer Gwen Petter. “Earthy neutrals, such as tans and beiges, are also in high demand for their ability to ground us and surround us with soothing natural tones.”

Beyond color, 40% of people report that they want a connection to nature, particularly in their kitchens, according to a survey by the National Kitchen and Bath Association (NKBA). Homeowners are choosing nature-inspired materials for focal areas like countertops, cabinets, and islands. Wilsonart® Home offers beautiful, on-trend options for virtually every surface in the home with performance features and price points to suit any lifestyle and

budget. The expertly curated collection includes environmentally sustainable materials such as high-pressure laminates and performance veneers that deliver the authentic looks of exotic woods, stone-inspired solid surface options, and non-porous engineered quartz.

2. “Resi-mercial” and Rustic

Fueled by the drastic decline in domestic and international travel during the pandemic, homeowner interest in replicating the sophisticated style and comforts of an upscale hotel or luxury resort in their home has continued to grow. From plush towels and perfectly plump pillows to spa-worthy bathrooms and chef-quality kitchens, commercially inspired designs are increasingly crossing over into the residential arena.

Carrara marble continues to be one of the most sought-after surfaces to achieve this clean, sophisticated, “resi-mercial” look, but not everyone desires the cost and maintenance that comes with the natural stone. The Wilsonart® Solid Surface Crafted Collection combines nature’s beauty with cutting-edge design innovation to deliver the look of authentic marble in an ultra-durable acrylic solid surface. This series of movement designs capture the beauty and drama of marble typically only seen in natural materials like quartz and stone with virtually limitless design applications for the kitchen, bath, and beyond.

Scandi Noir is another “resi-mercial” design approach that is gaining traction, particularly in kitchens. This style features looser rules and is characterized by the use of dark cabinets combined with dark countertops or contrasting dark and light surfaces. “Kitchen cabinets are still predominantly white, but more homeowners are adding a pop of color with contrasting island cabinets. In fact, searches for black and navy kitchens are up significantly,” notes Petter.

3. Sustainable Style

As our lives become increasingly home-centric, our homes need to perform on a level they may never have before, and this includes incorporating materials that work as hard as we do. “Today’s homeowners are seeking surfaces that will live up to the rigors of everyday life,” explains Petter. “There also is growing interest in sustainable alternatives to natural

products, which can contribute to deforestation and degraded air quality from sourcing and mining operations. Human-made composite materials offer appealing options that often outperform natural materials, delivering greater durability, less ongoing maintenance, and fewer harmful environmental impacts.”

Alternative materials like laminate, solid surface, and quartz mimic the best of Mother Nature without impacting the environment, offering appealing options for eco-conscious consumers. Many of these engineered surfaces are UL GREENGUARD Gold Certified to meet low chemical emissions limits for better air quality. Additionally, many laminate products are made with a combination of fibers from FSC-certified, fast-growing, sustainably managed woods and post-consumer recycled content (PCRC). For more information and inspiration, visit Wilsonart.com. (BPT)

— Please remember us when you or someone you know is in need of a home inspection. A referral from you would be a great compliment.