Rainbow FLORing

Rugs are essential, that’s one of the few things I’ve learned from my dog. He’s totally miffed at us for removing his wall-to-wall dog bed.

It was months ago, way early on in the flooring installation process that I began looking for area rug solutions to adorn our new hardwood base, because as much as we love the bright, light, reflective hardwood floors, layering a rug on top goes a long way in anchoring the furniture in a room, helping to control sound waves, serving as a dog resting pad, and as a warm place to get down with the game of Sorry. Next to Trouble, it’s probably the only game I could play all day long.

Because the hallway was the first space that we refinished with hardwoods, it became the first area in obvious need of a cushy rug solution. I  initially thought it was going to be hard to find a runner with the right proportions to fit in the 15′ long hallway, but for what it’s worth, I actually had a lot of luck searching overstock.com for rugs specific to the specs I was looking to find (and at a good price too), even if none of the patterns resonated with me as much as a design that I saw featured in one of FLOR‘s fall catalogs, a kitchen with a very rainbow-esque floor covering:

I’m a newbie to the FLOR market, but a rainbow fanatic (remember my last home’s palette?) and was quickly sold on buying a variety of colors of the Parallel Reality tiles when the tiles were 25% off in October (even bought extras in case one gets destroyed over the years). The squares are sold in many colors, I happened to choose the brighter of the tiles to achieve a look most like the catalog image, but ironically not the literal “rainbow” tiles offered.

I know, I know, it’s December and I’m just getting around to discussing this awesome new rug we brought into our home, but it has taken me awhile to figure out how to embrace it. Editor’s Update: Also, it’s totally not December. This isn’t even an old post, I only just whipped it up just last night. Maybe I need more sleep.

A few thingies:

• With white walls and blonde wood floors, color is something I’m really focused on having as the decor in this house begins to come together. Pops of color, if I dare to call it that and alienate all of you with overused phrases, interesting pieces of art, and area rugs like this one will be one way to start infusing color. The hallway is a cool space in that it leads to both girls’ rooms, rooms which will also be becoming very bright, colorful, and cheery, like big stinkin’ rainbows in their own right. Rainbow carpet squares seemed like a good fit.
• This particular product is low pile, though it’s really a mix of low piles which adds a little unexpected texture underfoot. I like it. And the Dyson likes it too. I was immediately reminded how much I hate having carpets with a long-haired shedding dog, and am doing everything I can to suck it up.
• I debated a lot whether 38.4″ (the width of two 19.2″ tiles) was going to be too wide for the space. I surveyed those of you who follow me on instagram/FB/twitter with this photo and this photo, making use of gift wrap to demonstrate a wide width and a narrower 30″ width. It really seemed that narrower would be better, a better overall proportion for the long hallway. I’m still not entirely sold, in part because I’m nervous I’ll screw up cutting them down to size, and because I’m not sure they need to be narrower to look good. Oh, and also because I’ve been preoccupied with other projects. So before I get all hacky with a utility knife, we’ve been living with it and seeing if it bugs us (we haven’t even affixed it together with the carpet sticky circles to keep it from separating).
• The white patches are most definitely no longer white, but don’t look so unintentional in their new ivory color, so I’m trying not to be anal about it.
• Very oddly, the tiles make our hallway look very short in this next photo, do they not? Strange illusion.

Hurray, color. We welcome you happily.