Choosing Flooring in London: What NICF Retailer Membership Means at Abbotts Interiors

Choosing a new floor should be one of the enjoyable parts of improving your home.

But with so much choice now available, it can also become surprisingly difficult.

Carpet or wood? LVT or engineered timber? Natural flooring or something easier to maintain? And once you have chosen the surface itself, there are still questions around preparation, underlay, measuring and fitting.

At Abbotts Interiors in Bow, East London, flooring has been part of the business for generations. Today, that experience is supported by our membership of the National Institute of Carpet and Floorlayers (NICF) as an NICF Retailer Member.

For us, it sits naturally alongside an approach we have always believed in: good advice, appropriate products and professional installation.

What is the NICF?

The National Institute of Carpet and Floorlayers is a recognised organisation within the UK flooring industry, promoting high standards, professionalism and quality workmanship.

Abbotts Interiors is an NICF Retailer Member, membership number R0087.

For customers choosing flooring, it provides another level of reassurance that they are dealing with a retailer that takes professional standards seriously.

But memberships and badges only tell part of the story.

What really matters is what happens when you walk through the showroom door with a room to floor and aren’t quite sure where to start.

More flooring choice than ever before

The flooring available to homeowners today is extraordinary.

At Abbotts, customers can explore everything from wool and synthetic carpets to wood and engineered flooring, luxury vinyl tile, natural floorcoverings, linoleum, Marmoleum, cork, rubber and woven vinyl.

Then there are rugs, stair runners, different underlays, finishes, colours, patterns and textures.

More choice is a good thing.

It does, however, make knowledgeable advice increasingly useful.

A floor isn’t something most of us change every year. Ideally, you want to make the right decision first time.

Start with the room, not the sample

It is very easy to fall in love with a flooring sample.

The more important question is whether that flooring is right for the room.

A carpet for a quiet bedroom has a very different job to do from one fitted on a busy family staircase.

Likewise, flooring for an entrance hallway needs to cope with different demands from flooring in a sitting room.

Before recommending anything, it is worth considering questions such as:

• How much traffic will the room receive?
• Are there children or pets?
• Is comfort underfoot particularly important?
• How much maintenance are you comfortable with?
• Is the room likely to experience spills or moisture?
• What is beneath the existing flooring?
• Do you want the floor to make a statement or quietly complement the rest of the interior?

Sometimes two products that look quite similar can perform very differently once they are installed.

That is where experience becomes valuable.

Ben Abbott: more than two decades of interiors experience

Ben Abbott represents the fifth generation of the Abbott family and has worked within the business for more than two decades. https://abbottsinteriors.co.uk/about

During that time, the flooring market has changed considerably.

Products such as luxury vinyl tile and engineered wood flooring have developed rapidly, while manufacturing improvements have created more colours, textures and finishes across almost every category.

At the same time, many traditional flooring choices remain as relevant as ever.

A beautifully made wool carpet can still be difficult to beat in the right room. Natural floorcoverings continue to bring wonderful texture to interiors. Wood flooring can become part of the character of a property for many years.

And bespoke stair runners remain one of the most effective ways of turning a staircase into a feature.

Ben and the Abbotts team spend a lot of time looking at new ranges and developments, but that doesn’t mean recommending the newest product simply because it is new.

The important question is always:

Is it right for this particular customer and this particular room?

Carpet, wood or LVT – which is right for you?

There isn’t one flooring material that is automatically better than all the others.

Each has its strengths.

Carpet

Carpet remains an obvious choice where warmth, comfort and softness underfoot are important.

Bedrooms, sitting rooms, landings and staircases are all areas where carpet can work beautifully.

But even within carpet, there is a considerable amount to consider – fibre, construction, pile, density, colour, pattern and how heavily the room will be used.

https://abbottsinteriors.co.uk/products/carpets

Wood and engineered flooring

For homeowners looking for something natural and timeless, wood flooring remains enormously popular.

Every timber floor has natural variation, which is part of its appeal.

Engineered construction has also made real wood practical for a wider range of interiors and applications. https://abbottsinteriors.co.uk/products/wood-flooring

Luxury vinyl tile

LVT has become one of the most versatile flooring choices available.

It can reproduce the appearance of timber, stone and other materials while providing a practical, hard-wearing surface suitable for many areas of the home.

For some households it can be an excellent solution.

For others, carpet or natural timber may be preferable.

It comes back to how the space is going to be used.

Natural flooring

Sisal and other natural floorcoverings can introduce wonderful texture and understated character.

They work particularly well in interiors where the flooring is intended to form part of the overall design rather than simply providing a neutral backdrop.

Again, suitability matters, because different natural materials behave differently in different environments.

Good flooring starts underneath the floor

One of the most important parts of a flooring project is often the bit you don’t see once the work is finished.

The subfloor.

Before new flooring is installed, the surface underneath needs to be suitable for the product being fitted.

Levels, condition and preparation can all affect the finished result.

With carpet, the appropriate underlay can influence comfort, appearance and performance.

With hard flooring, correct preparation can be particularly important.

This is why a professional flooring service isn’t simply about delivering the rolls or boxes you’ve selected.

Measuring, assessing the room and preparing properly are all part of achieving a good finished floor.

Abbotts provides measuring, estimating and professional fitting as part of its flooring service across London.

Why seeing flooring in person still makes a difference

You can research almost any flooring product online now.

That’s useful – and we would always encourage customers to arrive with ideas.

But flooring is still one of those products that benefits enormously from being seen and touched.

Colours displayed on screens can be deceptive.

The texture of a carpet cannot really be judged from a photograph.

The natural variation in timber becomes much easier to appreciate when you see a larger sample.

And two flooring choices that initially appear very similar online can feel completely different when compared side by side.

At the Abbotts Interiors showroom on Roman Road in Bow, customers can compare materials, colours and finishes and talk through the practical differences with the team.

Sometimes seeing another option in person completely changes the original plan.

Choosing flooring for more than one room

Another advantage of looking at flooring as part of a wider interior project is that every room doesn’t necessarily need the same solution.

You may decide on:

• wood or LVT through a hallway and living area;
• carpet upstairs;
• a distinctive runner for the staircase;
• something particularly practical for a kitchen or utility room.

The aim doesn’t have to be identical flooring throughout.

It can be about choosing materials that work for each space while still creating a home that feels connected.

With a broad flooring collection under one roof, Abbotts can help customers compare these different options as part of the same project.

Flooring has changed – good advice hasn’t

Abbotts has been part of Roman Road since 1882, and flooring has been central to the business throughout that history.

Needless to say, the products available today bear very little resemblance to the early floorcoverings sold by previous generations of the Abbott family.

Materials have changed.

Manufacturing has changed.

Styles have changed.

And homeowners have far more choice.

What hasn’t changed quite so much is the value of having somebody knowledgeable to help you make sense of that choice.

A good flooring retailer should be able to explain not simply what a product is, but whether it is suitable for your home, how it is likely to perform and what needs to happen before it is installed.

Our NICF Retailer Membership complements that long-standing approach to flooring: knowledgeable advice, careful specification, quality products and professional installation.

Looking for flooring in London?

If you’re considering new flooring in East London or elsewhere across London, visit Abbotts Interiors on Roman Road in Bow.

Whether you’re looking for carpet, wood, LVT, natural flooring or you’re simply not sure which option would work best, Ben and the Abbotts team will be happy to talk through the choices and help you find flooring that suits both your home and the way you live. https://abbottsinteriors.co.uk/contact