Herringbone hardwood going down in a Downtown Toronto room with wainscoted walls. Every piece was cut and fitted on site, with the mitre saw, compressor and nailer set up in the room as the pattern worked across the floor.
First, you are on a concrete slab rather than joists, which rules out nailing solid hardwood down and rules in engineered, vinyl plank and tile. Second, there is a unit below you, so the declaration sets an acoustic minimum – usually IIC 55 and STC 55, and higher in the older towers where the slab is thinner. Third, everything arrives and leaves through a booked service elevator inside a permitted work window, which constrains the schedule far more than the installation itself does. Plan around those three and a downtown floor is straightforward. Ignore any one of them and it is not.
Acoustic underlay, board submission and slab testing handled as one package.
Original industrial slabs that are rarely flat and usually need levelling first.
Retail and office units phased around your trading hours.
Usually IIC 55 and STC 55. Older buildings with thinner slabs frequently ask for IIC 60 or more.
Above 3 lbs per 1,000 sq ft over 24 hours, the adhesive or the floor has to change.
Floating floors need 3/16 of an inch over 10 feet. Downtown slabs are poured flat to a construction tolerance, not a flooring one.
These set the schedule. A missed booking costs a working day.
The logistics are half the job in the core. Material comes in through a booked service elevator inside a permitted window, waste goes out the same way, and neither happens at five on a Friday. Buildings differ enormously on how much notice they want and how long a booking runs. We confirm the rules with the property manager before ordering anything, because a floor sitting on a truck because the elevator is spoken for costs a day nobody budgeted.
Reviews collected directly from clients.
We chose Ontario Flooring for luxury vinyl plank installation in our basement. They prepared the subfloor properly, explained the process clearly, and delivered an even, durable finish.
Ontario Flooring installed new hardwood flooring throughout our home, and the results look beautiful. The crew was careful, professional, and kept the work area clean from start to finish.
In almost every condo, yes. The declaration governs hard-surface flooring and the board will want a submission showing the product, the underlay and a third-party acoustic certificate before work starts.
Not nailed down, because there is nothing to nail into. You can build a subfloor system over the slab, but it eats ceiling height and adds cost. Engineered hardwood gives you a genuine wood surface without either problem.
The installation is often two to four days for a typical unit. The calendar is set by board approval and elevator availability, which together commonly add two to six weeks before anything starts.