Wide Plank Oak Flooring for Balwyn North Rebuilds

Wide plank oak is often a good choice for a Balwyn North rebuild. The ground floors of these houses are usually one big open space, and a 2200 × 220 mm board gives it longer, calmer runs with fewer joins than a standard plank. The things to get right are the direction the boards run, a flat slab, and knowing where the wide format is less suited, which is usually the smaller rooms upstairs.

What the new houses in Balwyn North look like

Many of Balwyn North’s post-war houses have been knocked down and replaced, either with one large family home or with two townhouses on the block. The new single houses tend to follow a pattern: a slab ground floor with an open kitchen, dining and family area across the back, big glass doors to the garden, a separate study or lounge at the front, a staircase, and bedrooms upstairs on a timber-framed floor.

That open back area can easily run ten metres or more from the kitchen to the far wall. It is the kind of room where a floor is seen as one surface, and where the size of the board changes how the whole space reads. Our Balwyn North timber flooring page covers the older houses in the suburb; this guide is about the new ones.

Why the wide board suits a big open room

Across a large floor, a standard board can look busy, with many end joins and short lengths. A wide board reduces that. Compare the two on the same 45 m² room:

	Standard plank	Wide board
Board size	1900 × 190 × 15 mm	2200 × 220 × 15 mm
Area of one board	0.361 m²	0.484 m²
Boards to cover 45 m² (before offcuts)	about 125	about 93
Pack coverage	2.166 m² (6 boards)	2.904 m² (6 boards)

Roughly a quarter fewer boards means a quarter fewer joins to look at. The grain also has more room to show on each board, so a wide oak floor reads as timber rather than as stripes.

All our wide boards are engineered European oak with a 4 mm oak wear layer, micro bevel, tongue and groove, and a matte brushed surface.

The seven wide board colours

• White Smoke, our palest, with a whitewashed look.
• Blank, grouped with the light tones. The name doesn’t describe the colour, so it is best seen in person.
• Natural Oak, the classic oak colour, and the easiest to pair with most kitchens.
• Light Tan, a little warmer than Natural Oak.
• Mink, a muted colour between grey and brown.
• Edgey, darker with more character.
• Nero Brown, the deepest, for big bright rooms.

New Balwyn North homes usually have a lot of glass and a lot of other finishes chosen at the same time: stone benchtops, painted or timber joinery, black window frames. Bring offcuts or sample chips of them when you look at boards. A pale floor next to white stone reads bright and calm. A dark floor under a white kitchen gives the room weight, but shows dust and pale dog hair more.

Which way to run the boards

With long boards, direction matters more than usual, because you see the full length of each board. A few rules of thumb:

1. Run the boards along the longest view. In most rebuilds that means from the front of the house towards the garden, so the eye travels down the length of the boards to the glass.
2. Keep one direction through connected spaces. If the hallway flows into the living area without a door, changing direction at the opening can look unintentional.
3. Think about the light. Boards that run towards a big window tend to show their joints less than boards running across the light, because low sun rakes across the bevels.
4. Check the kitchen island. A long island set across the room works fine, but the boards should look deliberate against it, not at a slight skew to a wall that isn’t quite square.

In a big room, the installer sets out a starting line first and works from there, rather than starting at a wall that may be a little out.

A wide board needs a flatter floor

This is the main trade-off. A longer, wider board is less forgiving of a slab that dips or humps. A small hollow that a short board would bridge can leave the end of a wide board sitting slightly proud, and on a pale matte floor with low afternoon light coming through the back doors, that lip shows.

So on a wide board job, flatness is checked with a long straight edge across the whole area, high spots are ground and low spots filled with levelling compound. A new slab also needs to be dry enough before anything is glued to it. New slabs hold a lot of moisture, which is why we moisture test before installing and wait to lay boards until the readings suit the board and adhesive. If you are building, it helps to tell your builder early that the living areas are going to be a 15 mm engineered board so heights and door clearances can be planned. Our subfloor preparation page explains the levelling and testing.

Where the wide board is less suited

Upstairs bedrooms in these houses are often around three to four metres across. That is only fourteen to eighteen boards wide in the 220 mm format, and walk-in robes and ensuites break the room into short runs with lots of offcuts. Many owners keep the wide board downstairs and switch to the standard plank upstairs. Natural Oak, Light Tan, White Smoke, Edgey and Blank all come in both formats, so the colour carries through even if the width changes.

Herringbone is another alternative. Our project photos from Bulleen Road, Balwyn show a new home that went the other way, with 260 m² of pale Pearl White oak herringbone running through the entry, kitchen and living areas. If you like the idea of a pattern, it is worth looking at the project page before deciding. It is a useful reference for how a pale floor sits next to dark joinery and a lot of glass.

Wide boards on the stairs and landing

Most of these houses have a staircase rising out of the open living area, so the wide board meets the stair at the bottom step and again at the landing upstairs. Two details are worth settling before install day.

First, the landing. If the upstairs is going to be the standard plank, the landing is the natural place to change, because it is framed by the top nosing and the hallway. If the colour stays the same, the change in width is hard to spot. If the whole upstairs is going to be the wide board, run the landing boards the same way as the upstairs hallway so the two read as one floor.

Second, the stair treads. Treads are cut from board or matched stair pieces, not from a 2.2 metre length laid across the step, so the tread itself looks much the same whichever format is on the floor. What matters is colour and the nosing. Our guide to timber stairs covers the nosing choices and how the step heights are kept even.

Ordering: packs, offcuts and spares

Wide boards come six to a pack covering 2.904 m². To work out a rough order, add an allowance for offcuts to the room area and divide by 2.904. For a simple open rectangle, a small allowance is usually enough. Lots of doorways, angles and a kitchen island push it up. Round up to whole packs.

We recommend ordering enough for the whole job at once, plus a few spare boards kept in the garage. Boards from a later order can vary slightly in colour, and a matching spare makes a future repair much easier. For more on working out quantities, see our guide to engineered oak in Balwyn homes, which compares the plank and wide board side by side.

Next step: see full-length boards and book a measure

A small sample can’t show what a 2.2 metre board looks like across a room, but the wall displays at the Camberwell showroom can. You’re welcome to bring your benchtop and joinery samples and look at the wide boards at full length. Then book a free measure and quote, or send us your builder’s plans for an early estimate. You can call us on 1300 690 160 or visit us at 2/1386 Toorak Road, Camberwell.