Hand Scraping floors helps to deliberately give the appearance of aged wood. Sure, flawless floors are attractive, especially to perfectionists. However, the imperfections of hand scraped flooring is what make it perfect for people who appreciate how unique scrapes and uneven patterns create a distinct character.
Hand scraped hardwood flooring is popular for many other reasons. Apart from appealing to homeowners that are more inclined towards antique and rustic aesthetics, hand scraped wood is also durable and relatively easy to maintain. Here are some tips for maintaining your hand scraped hardwood floors:
Immediate care: Both dry and wet spills should be taken care of immediately. Use a broom and dustpan to sweep up dry spills right away. Dry spills, like sand, are abrasive and cause scratches on your floor – quickly wearing out the wood finish or the scraped ridges in the grain.
Wet spills should be wiped away with an absorbent towel right away. Don’t leave behind any residue. Wet spills can damage your hand scraped floors by allowing moisture to seep in.
Everyday care: When it comes to maintaining hand scraped hardwood floors, there’s the risk of over cleaning. And the need to clean each day will likely depend on foot traffic volume. If you have people or pets walking over your floors throughout the day and bringing in dirt from the outdoors, you’ll likely need to vacuum every day. Remember to vacuum with the beater bars turned off. Beater bars can be rough on hand scraped flooring and wear down the finish or cause scratches.
Bonus tip: To protect your hand scraped hardwood floors and avoid cleaning each day, you should consider having area rugs by your outside doors. Shoes can be taken off at your home’s entrance, helping prevent dirt from entering the house and ending up on the floor where it could get ground up and damage your floors.
Weekly/Monthly care: Dry and wet spills need to be taken care of right away. And you only need to focus on the affected area. To maintain your entire floor, you should be cleaning the whole floor regularly, such as weekly or monthly – depending on how often the floor is used.
Mopping is an excellent cleaning method for hand scraped floors; however, you should never use a traditional soaking wet mop as it can lead to moisture seeping into the wood and causing water damage. We recommend using the Glitsa Maintenance Mop with the cleaning pad and Glitsa Clean™. Clean your floors as needed with a dampened Glitsa maintenance mop with the included microfiber pad for damp mopping. Simply spray the pad with the Glitsa Clean solution or spray the cleaner directly on the wood floor and mop.
Glitsa Clean is a pH neutral, water-based wood floor cleaner specifically formulated to clean your hand scraped floors without leaving a dulling residue. Glitsa Clean comes in both a concentrate solution and a Ready-to-Use spray. To use the concentrate, mix 1/4 cup concentrate for every 1 quart of water, and the Ready-to-Use spray is premixed and ready to go.
