This is a 7" plank engineered Chilean Cherry. We love the look. The beauty of the wood is not broken into small bits which is what I like about it.

Jodi-

Jodi, I always love pictures of your gorgeous wide plank floor that has the prettiest color and grain. But your rooms are big with a lot of light. Also the wood has variations in color but not as much as Brazilian Cherry so I am wondering how Brazilian Cherry floors would look in a 5" wide plank. But your floors are showing me that they may look wonderful. If I had bigger rooms and lighter furniture, I may choose what you chose since it is stunning. Thank you for sharing the pictures.

I never heard of Chilean Cherry but it is gorgeous. Brazilian can really vary, if you like that look.

Why engineered and not solid? If there is a moisture concern, go with engineered, but I don't know that width makes a difference. In solid, the narrower the planks the more dimensionally stable. Sorry I can't be of more help. But I like the look of 3.25" - 5", not narrower or wider. If you have smaller rooms the 5" may make them look larger, plus installation will go quicker. Have you tried figuring how many full widths of either would be used? You don't want to end up with a narrow 1" strip right at one wall. If you have 12 ft wide rooms and that's the way the planks will run (perpendicular to joists) then the 3.25" will give you 44 planks with 1/2" gap at each wall (just about what needs to be for expansion for solid, not sure if engineered needs that but baseboard will hide the gap anyway). 5" would only use 28 full width boards with last board being 4", no gaps at all. So I'd say if you need any gap for expansion, 3.25" would work better.

I'll preface by saying I don't remember all of the details. We have narrow plank Brazilian cherry hardwood in 1600 continuous square feet of our house. You need to be careful if you're putting it in large or continuous areas because of the color variation: if can look "zebraish" depending on the grade of wood that you buy. We bought the "high" grade of wood and the color is pretty even. One thing that the seller (a friend of ours, so I trusted her judgment) told us was that you can get by with some shorter boards than if you buy the lesser grade (with more color variation) that has longer boards. You can make a trade-off with "more even color with shorter boards" or "less even color with longer boards". I hope you can make sense of this; it's hard to explain. I'll try again: we opted for a higher grade of wood with less color variation but, as a tradeoff, we have some shorter boards. I love this floor!

ajasmama, I have to go with Engineered Floors due to having my townhouse built in the preserved wetlands owned by my town that keeps buying land so no one can build on the land so the township where I live can have a little bit of country like atmosphere despite being less than 1 hour from NYC. They have a pond here and a great sewer system installed so we never have water in our homes. We have no basements and the floors are cement slabs. Behind the woods are luxury homes that I wonder if they have no basements also.

I had two installers here (the local store sent to measure my home an find out how difficult it would be to move the furniture in my home office.... easy to do the family room they told me but the office is a problems) trying to push me to go with the 3.25" engineered width plank telling me it is more stable than the 5" width plank regarding expansion and contraction purposes and handling all the heavy putty 42" wide lateral file cabinets that I have in my home office as well as my cherry office furniture. But then they told me it would be best if I did a laminate. I told them I made up my mind that I love the Brazilian Cherry engineered wood.

maryanne3, your post helped since I love the quality of the wood on the 3.25" wide planks since it is a sawn sliced cut and not a rotary peel cut and is a a very high grade of the wood. Your floor sounds beautiful. I am glad you told me you love your floor despite the shorter boards. I think the wider planks have 3.00 MM instead of the 3.6 MM wear layer on top due to the trade-off of wider width with 5" thickness instead of 3.25" slimmer width with only a 3/8th thickness. I wonder if they both have the same quality of wood or is the cut nicer on the slimmer boards. But that is important to me to have a nice grade of the wood.

To add to above followup: most of the boards are long, but there are some short ones. Our floors were site finished (messy, messy) because we didn't want the "groove" from prefinished (or engineered?) I no longer remember the differences! We did the floors about 4 years ago, and they've held up well.

Hmmm, I didn't think expansion/stability was an issue with engineered floors, so wouldn't think 3 1/4" vs 5" would make a difference (on a slab I can see why you have to go engineered). I would contact the manufacturer of the floor you are considering and ask them about that. But, all things being equal, did your installers say anything about how much of an expansion gap they would leave at the walls? Did you get a precise measurement of the room width (across the joists), since it's probably not *exactly* 12 feet? If you did the 5", just be aware that if there is a gap required (to be hidden by baseboard/shoe), the boards at the walls may end up being 3-4" and not 5" - are you OK with that? Depending on the dimensions of the room, the 3.25" may work out better, as I said above. Do the math. Also, if there is a possibility of refinishing in the future I would go with the thicker finish (hardwood) layer. Is there a difference in the overall thickness of the 3.25" vs the 5"? How would it make a difference in any transition to other flooring?

Good luck with your decision.

I have the 5" engineered BC throughout my house, including a guest bedroom the is 12' x 12' and an office the is smaller than that.

I personally prefer the look of the 5" plank and think it looks just as good in the smaller rooms as it does in the larger rooms. I think there is plenty of variation in the colors of the boards with the 5".

Here are a few of the pics, soory I don't have a really good one of just the floors:{{gwi:1504361}}

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Sprice5105, I love your 5" width Brazilian Cherry Floors. Your rooms are beautiful and that rug is perfect for your dining room. What brand did you use and was it a solid or engineered since it is just perfect for your rooms. I also love how it looks with your furniture in your guest bedroom.

Hi Lynn,

My floors are engineered floors made by Shaw.

Sprice, I just love your floors so much! I found the post where you first showed them off and I got to see more of your floors and home. I love your beautiful home. I wish more of the floor was showing. Thank you for sharing.

I hope some others will share their exotic wood floors that are wide plank or even just 3.25" plank since I am trying to make up my mind now if the approximately $700.00 extra is worth paying for the wider and longer boards.

The BR-111 Triangulo is 1/2" thick when it is 5" wide versus 3/8th" thick when it is 3.25" wide. Both have a nice wear layer on top that can be sanded 2 to 3 times with a 24 year warranty.

Do the darker boards really stand out with the wider boards. One of my friends in Canada who I called tonight loves both widths but prefers widths no narrower than 3.25" and likes widths even up to 7" wide feeling more of the grain shows and the floor is less busy. My other friend who I called likes the 3.25" traditional look. I guess I will have to make my own decision but I hope I get to see some more pictures before ordering the floor. I wish I had some samples boards that were at least a foot long of the 5" wide planks. I only have the foot long sample boards of the 3.25" wide planks that someone on this forum mailed to me and I paid her for the postage.

Is the 3.25" wide floor still in style and popular despite wider planks being very trendy right now?

Lynn- I got the Mirage at Hoskings Hardwood floors and got a good deal. The 2.25 width does not look busy for me even though some are short (at least not in the low sheen) It depends on your installer- they have to mix it up so that there are not patterns showing in the floor. A matter of taste.

I've had this floor down two years and I don't think that I will ever refinish it. I have only a couple of dents or scratches, and due to the low sheen, they don't show. I've actually filled in one or two with a colored marker and they don't show. So the wear layer is not that important, if you have a low sheen.

You may after many years do a screening on it, which is not a full refinishing. If you do that, you will probably never refinish the floor.

3.25 is trendy. I did that in one house and moved. Did 2.25 in the next. Like it better. Best is if you can see the floors in person. Maybe you could go to open houses that have hardwood floors.

Sprice,

Great floors. I was wondering how long you had them installed? From what I understand, BC floors are supposed to darken in about 6 months after their install.

Chinchette, Thank you for letting me know that your beautiful floors are only 2.25" and have been down 2 years since I love your floors. So maybe I will be happy with either size board (3.25" or 5") of the BR-111. The reason I want to be able to sand or refinish in the future is if I ever move and take all my furniture out of here and find that the floors are not in great shape from my 4 little dogs (4 lbs to 7.5 lbs so I am not worried about their nails and they do not shed) and from clients visiting and all the heavy furniture on top of it. If I have a nice wear layer on top of the floor, I can refinish the floors before resale if I need to or let the buyer know they they have this option.

aamir, I also would love to know how long Sprice's floor has been down since it is so beautiful and is the color I like.

Ours are right about 3" (don't remember off-hand, and am not at home to measure)

We chose this width because it is was closest to the width of the original hardwood (100+years old) on the first floor of the house ... nothing trendy about that! :)

The floors have definitely darkened over time, though gradually enough that I had to pick up rugs to check. And it's more that the color sort of ... evens out. I was worried that it was too busy when we first put it down, which was when this picture was taken. Since then, though, it has definitely mellowed into a deeper, more consistent color; no current picture, though. The variations read as texture more than anything.

I think the boards varied in length from about 18" to 7-8' or so.

I have 5 and I wish I'd gone larger 7.
I think it's all depending on the look you are after.
Smaller width is more formal & larger width is more casual/country.

embees, thank you for the picture and information. I am glad you like your floors better now that look nice in the 3" wide plank.

bellaflora, thanks for letting me know that you love wide plank floors and wish you had gone wider.

We have 4" site finished BC floors. We would have gone wider(to 5") if it wasn't so expensive to upgrade through our builder.

lishaana, I love your floors with the 4" wide being a nice width giving color variation and allowing the beautiful wood grain to show. I really appreciate you sharing. I love the architectural elements in the room with the window style and arches, the crown molding and the rest of the details that you have done in your beautiful room with that gorgeous floor.

I called BR-111 today since their website says 12" to 48" on the 3.25" wide planks while the samples and the online descriptions say up to 42". I was told about one year ago, BR-111 increased the length of their planks to 48" for their Triangulo Engineered 3.25" floors.

So now I have this in consideration.

I am having the worst time with the company and installers on more costs now due to the installers feeling I have moisture on my concrete and have to install a special expensive moisture sealer glue first before gluing the floor down. Others in my complex have installed floating floors that are engineered so I do not understand why they can not float my BR-111 floor but they claim that BR-111 is best glued down especially with heavy file cabinets on it.

I am stressed since the company wants me to find a laminate I like and the only one I liked was the Pradoo and the Makore laminates by Bruce Park Avenue. However, I had my heart set on Brazilian Cherry.