Traditional Flooring

When you want to create the look of traditional floors without installing actual hardwood, Greatmats offers a number of options that work for a quick DIY job.

Select from our engineered hardwood, laminate, LVT, and LVP flooring. These products generate an impressive look that either uses faux-printed vinyl or visible veneer layers that contain actual hardwood. This style of tile will work for either residential or commercial layouts, creating a luxury look at a far lower price.

Size and Shape Options

When seeking traditional floors that mimic the appearance of hardwood planks, it’s helpful to use rectangular-shaped pieces. This rectangular shape delivers a highly realistic look for those installing these floors, mimicking the planks used in a real hardwood floor.


Some of these products will include varying lengths of planks in the same carton, which adds to the realistic look of the final layout by generating randomness.

Plank width varies from product to product, which helps the installer create the desired look. Some installers prefer wider planks to create a certain feel in the design, while others prefer a narrow type of plank.

In these products, plank widths typically range from 5 to 12 inches. The lengths of the planks may range from 12 to 72 inches.

The thicknesses of these planks typically will range from 3/16 to 1/2 inches. If you select an engineered hardwood plank with veneer, the veneer layer typically will measure 1.5 or 2 mm (about 1/16 inch).

Material Options

Traditional floors from Greatmats are available in a few different types of materials.

• Cork laminate: Cork flooring has a shock-absorbing design that’s also highly durable.
  
• Engineered hardwood: These planks consist of a thick plywood base layer that provides stability and a thin veneer layer of actual hardwood that hides the plywood.
  
• LVP: LVP, short for luxury vinyl plank, consists of recyclable laminate as the base material with a printed layer across the top that looks like hardwood.
  
• LVT: LVT, short for luxury vinyl tile, also uses a recyclable laminate base layer with a printed layer over the top that usually resembles stone.

Pattern and Texture Options

The numerous patterns and textures that are provided by these products are appreciated by those who opt to install planks that resemble traditional floors.


The veneer layer on the engineered hardwood planks often has a texture included with it, such as wire brushed or hand scraped. This results in a texture that’s similar to what you would find with an actual vintage hardwood. These planks may even contain realistic knots and splits, all in the veneer layer.

Multiple wood stain colors are available in these products as well. Stain colors of dark browns, light browns, dark grays, and light grays are all available with engineered hardwood flooring planks.

The stain colors will have slightly variable shades within each plank, again creating the same look as the different color shades found with wood stain on a vintage hardwood floor.

With the printed layer in vinyl planks, the colors also attempt to mimic actual wood stain colors. Some of the vinyl planks may have an embossed texture on them too.

Common Use Options

These traditional floors can appear in either commercial or residential layouts.


Homeowners will appreciate the rich look of actual wood from these products without the expense and hassle of needing to refinish the floors in the future. Homeowners can place these planks in almost any room of the house, including kitchens, bedrooms, and bathrooms.

For commercial installation, our customers include restaurants, hotels, taverns, churches, offices, and government buildings. A business that rents cabins or that builds apartments and condos can use these floors to create a luxury feel in the space.

These floors have a high level of durability, so they will last for decades.

Installation Options

Typically, these planks will have a tongue-and-groove design on the edges. The installer pops the edges together. There is no need to add glue to the edges, as the interlocking edges alone will hold tightly in the final layout.


With thinner planks, installers may want to use glue on the underside of the floor to attach it to the subfloor. Some manufacturers of these planks recommend using brad nails to attach the planks to the subfloor.

Some designs work best as a floating floor installation, which means using no adhesive, nails, or glue.

Cleaning and Maintenance Requirements

To clean these traditional floors, start by removing dry debris. A broom, vacuum cleaner, or dust mop should take care of dust and dirt. If the vacuum has a beater bar head, it could cause marks on the flooring, however.


Customers can wet mop the floor to clean it thoroughly on occasion. Make use of a neutral pH cleaner diluted with water to mop these types of flooring. Avoid cleaners that contain bleach.

The manufacturer recommends using curtains or drapes to prevent the floors from receiving full sunlight for long periods, which could result in fading over time.