This is the third installment of our interview with Pioneer Millwork’s Sales Manager Jered Slusser around the genesis of our engineered Black and Tan reclaimed wood flooring. In this post he answers: “How does engineered flooring’s consistency effect its installation in commercial or home spaces?”

“One of the great things about our Black and Tan as a material is the consistency. This product originates from fence boards which are always consistent. So, we are always getting in material that looks pretty similar to what we have gotten previously, that means we can make a floor now that will look just like another floor that we will make in five years,” says Jered Slusser, Sales Manager for Pioneer Millworks.

“We have projects that have used this material because they know it was going to be phased over several years. One year they could do one area of the office and then go back and do the next area the next year and so on and so forth. There is little chance of there being a variation in the material visually; you would still see the exact same color throughout the entire project. There is almost no reclaimed material that you can get that level of consistency with.”

Over the course of 4 years an industrial office building in Texas incorporated 10,000+ sf of our Pioneer Millworks Black & Tan into its space. The clients remodeled individual levels of the building in stages, and the consistency of the Black & Tan oak made the remodel work appear to have been done collectively with no visual difference in the batches, which is often an essential ingredient for larger projects.

Slusser continues, “Our engineered Black and Tan can be used in a wide variety of installation applications. Of course, wood flooring, above ground, below ground, slab on grade, radiant heat installations, it can do all of it. It can be nailed down or glued down, so it opens up a lot of different options there. It can be used on vertical surfaces as a wall material. If we are using our naked polyurethane finish, we can add a Class A fire retardant to that surface, which is why we seeing it used in office spaces, restaurants, supermarkets, and a variety of different applications where you might need a surface that’s more easily cleanable and has that Class A fire retardant.”

In addition to our engineered Black and Tan oak’s consistency is its flexibility to play in any design idea. We offer an array of finishes that make it perfect for creating shapes as well as developing natural blends and contrasts.

Slusser says, “The great thing about the 4.5” wide sizing of the Black and Tan product is that it makes for great pattern floors like chevron’s, herringbones, or standard patterns. The fact that its engineered makes it very stable, but also because of the lengths that it comes in it works really well when we cut it down for use in a multitude of patterns. Our standard Black and Tan floor is finished with a UV cured hard waxed oil that we call “Pure.” It adds a really nice depth of color to the floor, and it also gives you the ability to touch up the floor as needed. We also furnish this material with a water based polyurethane topcoat and we call this our “Naked” finish – it’s clear, it does not add any color to the wood”.

Whether you are looking to warm up a cold office space in need of a biophilic blend, create a contemporary look in a country cottage, or add a traditional touch to a modern home, our reclaimed and engineered Black & Tan oak is flexible, consistent, and safe enough to accommodate projects of every size and intent.