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Willowpondgj

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All you wise ones:
What are the best rugs for entrance ways (for durability and ease of cleaning) ?
Best for outdoor doormats?
Best for common areas (area rugs)?
Do you use anti fatigue mats in kitchen? Or do you recommend a good brand of kitchen rug?
I have tried the kitchen slice rugs - they get ruined in about a week, I have tried the olefin rugs and the latex crumbles, I do have some that have held up nicely for about a year that I got from Kohls but they are starting to show their age... How long can we realistically expect them to last?
Thanks!!!!
 
My victorian home is furnished with large rugs purchaced for me by my niece at garage sales. They are beautiful and wear well.
At the front door, I have an olefin and it has been doing well.
Kitchen is a different matter, I am looking too. Outdoors I have just a rug on the porch but probably need something else.
 
I have Orientals most places as we have old hardwood floors. The one just inside the door is a heavy poly-wool blend (newish) that the Oriental rug place threw in for free when I bought several for the Inn when we arrived. Any new area rugs in the rooms since then - we have only bought a few since after cleaning what was here - are Oriental type and wool (not poly). No kitchen rugs. Our kitchen has hardwood also and I don't find it to be a problem for me.
Some of the Orientals have been used for at least 25 years at the Inn from the original owners. I have had to have a few re-fringed but otherwise they look good.
Overstock.com is a a good source especially when there are sales and free shipping. I got my outdoor rug at Target - just your basic outdoor sisal-type rug.
 
I used the anti-fatigue mats in the kitchen. They were heavy and long and I washed the tops of them every day, pulled them up and washed the underside and top when we did the floors. They were kitty corner, one all along the sink and counter area, one along the stove and food prep area. They helped a lot as I spent probably four hours standing there prepping, cooking, and washing up (subtracting the walking over to guests time). There is a thread someplace on here about this I think. I don't remember where I bought them. They were expensive but held up great. And much more practical than the cute little kitchen rugs I started out with.
I used a very rugged rug (haha) inside the front door -- very flat nap with ridges and a rubber bottom so it never moved off the hard wood floor. Not a pretty rug, but the muck and guck that came in on people's shoes even after wiping on the outer rug told me that I needed an industrial rug. Sometimes guests would take off their shoes and line them up along the wall in the hall when they saw the hardwood floors gleaming beyond the entrance. And I had a place for 'water shoes' outside on the long front porch for folks coming back from water sports. I never asked folks to do this. But was happy when they removed those soggy shoes!
Area rugs on the hardwood floors tended to slip so I didn't use them. In areas where they were needed on old, painted wood floors, we tacked them in place with tiny nails which I checked all the time just in case of loosening.
 
I would just LOVE to have an anti-fatigue runner in my galley (kitchen), but I haven't found one that is attractive and I haven't got it in me to put in something commercial looking...yet. Guest can see that area as they walk by.
I at my doors and over a bad spot in the parquet wood floor I intend to remove and replace with teak & holly flooring, I used an inexpensive runner. What I have recently learned is that you've got to inspect the rubber backing. In about a year, the backing began to "decompose" for lack of a better term. And one day, all of the sudden, the properties in the rubber changed and glued the rug to the floor. This has happened twice, and twice it ripped up the parquet flooring. When I say "all of the sudden", I mean it was fine one day when I picked it up to sweep and the next day, it was glued. That was the strangest thing I had seen...and it's happened twice.
Now, I regularly inspect my aging rugs and try to replace them within a year's time or when the backing starts to become brittle and crack. Fortunately, I just use two runners (one of which is in my galley) and two small rugs at the pilothouse doors, so the annual cost is only around $50 to replace these each year.
 
My entry has a wool oriental with fringe. I would prefer fringeless and will go that route next purchase. I have a very large front veranda and have a 10'x12' outdoor rug leading to the front door made of polywoven fibers. Very durable. Purchased at Lowes.
I will tell you that even this large of an outdoor rug does not prevent guests from stepping in and rubbing their shoes on my nice oriental. I do not get it.
 
'Entryway' are area rugs I got from JCP. Nice 'oriental' pattern, guests actually wipe their shoes right on them even tho I have a 'shoe mat' immediately inside the door. I've had them down for 2 years and they are great. Each entryway has a different color, one red, one green and the coordinating runner in the hallway. I hold them down with rug tape that sticks to the floor.
The living room has a wool rug. I rotate that each year as one end of it is the 'traffic pattern' to get thru to the guest rooms.
No mats in the kitchen at all. If we put one down, it would cover the entire floor anyway!
 
I got wool rugs for my entry from Penneys and they have shown NO dirt or wear. I love them. I find wool lasts and believe it or not stays cleaner. I am not sure why but now I only will buy wool rugs. They last forever. I got a wool rug for under the table and it shows nothing at all. I am looking for a new wool rug for the living room. They have a lot of wool rugs at a bargin from TJ Max here but I need a big one for the living room. The biggest one they usually have is 9x12. They are a great price there.
Oh only the biggest TJ Max have the rugs.
 
I got wool rugs for my entry from Penneys and they have shown NO dirt or wear. I love them. I find wool lasts and believe it or not stays cleaner. I am not sure why but now I only will buy wool rugs. They last forever. I got a wool rug for under the table and it shows nothing at all. I am looking for a new wool rug for the living room. They have a lot of wool rugs at a bargin from TJ Max here but I need a big one for the living room. The biggest one they usually have is 9x12. They are a great price there.
Oh only the biggest TJ Max have the rugs..
I have wool rugs in my own entryway. I'm glad to hear the wool is hoding up under 'guest' traffic as well. We cleaned out wool runner for the first time ever last week. Ewwwwwwwwww! And I'm sure we could have cleaned it 2-3 times and had the same reaction. But, other than being 'darker' than it was when I bought it, it still looks great. As well as the wool rug we leave our wet shoes on.
I wanted to try the other rugs in the guest areas in case they were going to get beat up with suitcases and spilled coffee. That way I wouldn't feel badly about having to get different ones. So far, they're fine and I love the colors I got.
But, yes, if wool is available, it will hold up longer. And Home Goods carries them if there is not a TJ Maxx in the area (same parent company). Ditto Tuesday Morning.
 
I got wool rugs for my entry from Penneys and they have shown NO dirt or wear. I love them. I find wool lasts and believe it or not stays cleaner. I am not sure why but now I only will buy wool rugs. They last forever. I got a wool rug for under the table and it shows nothing at all. I am looking for a new wool rug for the living room. They have a lot of wool rugs at a bargin from TJ Max here but I need a big one for the living room. The biggest one they usually have is 9x12. They are a great price there.
Oh only the biggest TJ Max have the rugs..
I agree. We have all wool rugs here except for a couple of olefin rugs. I have a small rug just inside the front door for people to wipe their feet before you hit the bigger wool rug in the reception hallway , but we don't have the Winter weather here with lots of muck. All these wool rugs repel water & other spills better, I think. I've found good deals at TJ Maxx, Marshall's & Tuesday Morning. Did buy a couple of large wool rugs at Lowe's and Home Depot on a buy now-pay later promotion. They've held up well. Like Bree, I rotate the large ones a couple of times a year.
I got rid of all the rugs in the kitchen. We have wood laminate in there. It's just easier to damp mop & not worry about rugs. The laminate is OK on my feet.
 
I got my rugs at the Carpet Warehouse. In 1995 I bought a large remnant and had them cut a backward L and bind it for my halway and the remainder was bound ad the area rug in the dining room. It was a medium blue and after about 10 years of tromping over it, spilling on it, and coffee drips, etc it was starting to show stains - not wear. I replaced the vlue with a burgundy - doing the same thing. Also replaced the area carpet in the room my B-I-L was in at the same time and I think I got all for around $600. there were extra pieces also - had everything bound. Gave a large piece to a friend for her son's workshop floor and still have a piece I have not figured out what to do with yet - it is just rolled up and standing in a corner until I do.
The area rugs in Rosi's, the Gillum, the upstairs hall, our room, and my Library all date to 1995 and 1996 and still look good. And I think they are wool.
Edited to add: There was a woll rug with a jute pad in the dining room when we bought the house that took both of us (DH was able to do things then) to muscle it out to the curb. We found out that it was there in the 1970s when the PO bought the house but have no clue as to when the Gillums bought it other than to peg it to about 1952 when they moved rooms - upstairs bedroom moved into dining room, dining room moved into kitchen, and kitchen moved to the back porch (which it is colder than a witch's nose in winter!) and long and narrow - 19 ft x 9 ft and is kitchen & laundry area.
 
Nothing with a fringe that gets sucked up in the vacuum each time!
Obv if money is no object then WOOL and MULTI COLOR to hide stains. HEAVY RUGS, THE HEAVIER THE BETTER!
 
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