Ambient Bamboo Flooring FSC Certified, High Quality, Durable

Ambient Bamboo Floors has been selling high-quality bamboo floors for over 25 years. If  you’ve had any experience with bamboo flooring you will know that its durability depends on many factors. I have spoken with a few people who’ve installed it believing they were choosing a well-priced environmentally friendly product. Within five years, however, they had to tear up that floor and put in a completely new one due to wear beyond repair. How environmentally friendly is a floor that needs to be replaced after five years? The old adage remains true: you get what you pay for. If you cut down on price, it usually means quality is lowered as well.

These factors are particularly true for bamboo flooring. It goes back to how bamboo is grown and harvested. It is a grass and can be harvested after four years and up to seven. The longer it grows, the stronger the grass stalks become, the more durable the flooring will be.

Ambient has been working with the same group of factories in China since 2005, so it has a solid history with the product. I asked Alex Everett, spokesperson for Ambient Bamboo Floors about the product and the practices at the factory. Here are some of the features of the flooring:

• It is FSC Certified
• Has a lifetime structural warranty and a 30 year finish warranty
• It can be installed by anyone and will maintain its warranty
• Floors come prefinished in either Accuseal polyurethane or a Hardwax oil finish
• Floors can be glued down, recommended glue is Bilder’s Ultimate All in One, or Bilder’s Choice (both low VOC)

One thing to note: bamboo does behave like wood in terms of humidity and moisture. It’s recommended that indoor humidity range between 35-55% moisture in order to avoid shrinkage in dry conditions.

In addition, the website points out some of the advantages of bamboo:

• It is three times harder than oak
• termite resistant and rot resistant
• can be installed over radiant heating

The company uses a carbonization technique to produce the darker floors. This is a heating method that affects the entire piece of wood, so it’s coloured all the way through the floor.

For pricing, visit this page (note all prices are in US dollars).

Amibient will ship to Canada.

To see Ambient’s full line of products visit the website.