Carpet Appearance Pitfalls

Carpet Appearance Pitfalls in Interior Design and Decorating

The problems that can arise with carpet

As with any flooring product, there are always advantages and disadvantages of using them. With carpet there are a few disadvantages with the appearance of the product, but they are outweighed by the advantages, which are soft under foot, warm, luxurious looking, simple to install, most quality carpets last for a long time and stay looking good. Here are the few carpet appearance pitfalls that may occur.

Flattening

This is expected on any type of carpet in high traffic areas such as doorways around furniture under desks etc. It is just the pile flattening or the pile being repositioned. It is more noticeable in plain cut pile carpets as there is a definate difference between the top and side of the yarn tuft. To ease this problem vacuuming or wet or dry cleaning will temporary revive the pile.

Shading

This is irregular light and dark patches occurring on the carpet. It looks similar to tracking but it is not temporary. It is more obvious in plain dark colors so ensure you consider this factor on selecting a carpet, as shading isn’t a manufacturing defect, as it doesn’t affect the products durability.

Tracking

This is as it sounds, the imprints of your feet left on the carpet. It is more predominant on cut piles than loop piles and is only a temporary problem as it vanishes after vacuuming.

Carpet Appearance Pitfalls - Carpet tracking

Carpet tracking

Conclusion

As you can see, these aren’t major problems, but you should be aware of them if you are going to purchase carpet or specify it for a client if you are an interior decorator or designer. Some people cannot stand seeing tracking, it drives them crazy and this is only visible on some forms of carpet, so you need to be able to let them know that the lovely plush cut pile carpet they are choosing will not be ideal for them, they need to be made aware that tracking may occur. Get the carpet supplier to provide a large sample so you can put it on the floor and walk over it. See if it tracks and see if they can live with it. They most probably will be better off choosing a loop pile carpet.

More Articles on Carpet

Carpet Construction

Types of Carpet Fibres – Natural

Types of Carpet Fibres – Man Made Synthetic

Pile

Types of Carpet – 1

Underlay

Installation

Color Consultant course