I have a 60 year old house originally built by the Department of Housing or 60 year old equivalent. It's small but solid and we decided to retain it and renovate. In hindsight, not a great decision because it's cost far more than we anticipated. One of the things we did was pull up the carpet and sand/polish floorboards.

The boards had slight termite damage (they have been treated annually since this was detected by the previous owners) so they were repaired by a chippie - poorly - then finished off myself. I did a better job on the boards he missed, for example, when removing a single board, he would cut into the adjacent boards with a circular saw. I cut through partially, then chiselled down to the required level, saving an unsightly cut in the adjacent boards.

We then had a tradesman come in and sand and finish the boards in a water-based finish. Much lighter than poly, shows up the grain, but also shows up the filler used in the gaps and the flaws. We also found we missed some of the termite damage in the hallway so we'll have to go through some of this rigmarole again. Even still, there are gaps between some of the boards, a permanent stain in the kitchen, and various other imperfections that detract from the look. Not in a rustic way, either. More inconsistent than anything. The other issue is that we have a big inside dog that is scratching up the floor quite efficiently.

Instead of trying to fix the floors up like new, I've thought of trying to artificially distress the boards. I've seen an excellent finish in an engineered board that I'd like to try and emulate but not sure how this could be achieved. It looks like it's been run through a machine that has mottled the top, then it's been stained to highlight the flaws. It's quite rough but looks easy to clean and very easy to maintain because any scratches would just blend in. Perfect!

Any ideas on how this could be achieved and if anybody has done this before? Pictures would also be welcome.


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