The term "carbonized" refers not only to a color of bamboo flooring but to the manufacturing process. When natural bamboo is kiln-baked, the sugars inside "carbonize" or "caramelize", giving this floor it's rich brown hue. This color runs throughout the plank, so that when refinished it retains it's beautiful brown hue.
Bamboo is carbonized by high pressure steaming or heating, which “caramelizes” the bamboo fibers—resulting in a rich auburn tint. It’s a similar process to “caramelizing” sugar, which turns dark and gooey after being heated. Though the same look can be achieved with staining, there are important differences that need to be taken into consideration. Unlike staining, which only affects the surface of the wood, carbonized bamboo is the same color throughout—which means this type of flooring can be refinished without losing its color. The darkness of the color is proportional to the length of time the bamboo is carbonized.
Many of our carbonized bamboo floors are of strand woven construction which results in the hardest wood floors on the market. Strand woven bamboo flooring is made when heated strips of bamboo are separated into strands, then woven together and compressed with high-pressure heat and environmentally safe resins. The weaving structure reinforces and increases the strength of the bamboo, resulting in equal (and sometimes even greater) hardness to traditional hardwood. There's a common misconception that the carbonization process weakens strand woven bamboo flooring but in fact this is only true of "classic" bamboo flooring (horizontal and vertical grains), and even then the difference in hardness between the carbonized and natural colors is negligible.
Carbonized bamboo flooring is an excellent choice if you’re looking for beauty, ease of maintenance, and versatility. The deep, varied hues of carbonized bamboo offers the warmth, elegance, texture, and atmosphere that hardwood flooring provides, along with lower costs of installation and maintenance. It is also widely regarded as an environmentally friendly alternative, which is an important consideration if you and your family want to enjoy the benefits of enhanced safety and air quality.
All of our carbonized bamboo floors are finished with our patented AccuSeal system, which protects the flooring and ensures hassle-free cleaning. Made with cutting edge industrial materials under the strictest manufacturing standards, our 10-coat protective finish is water-based and scratch resistant, ensuring the perfect combination of beauty and durability. Here at Ambient Bamboo Floors, you never have to choose between beauty and function—our AccuSeal® finishing system is backed by a lifetime warranty so you and your family can walk (and even run!) easy knowing that your flooring will last for years to come.
The quality of bamboo can affect the hardness of the floor—this is why we only use fully mature Grade A Moso bamboo, which is harvested in ecologically managed forests. We wouldn’t think of offering our iron clad warranty if we didn’t use only the best materials for our products.
Customization and color adjustment is easy with carbonized bamboo, since it offers an excellent foundation for a variety of custom stain finishes. This makes it an ideal choice if you want the flooring to match your decor rather than the other way around. Because all of our carbonized bamboo floors are strand woven, it looks very much like the naturally occurring grain in hardwood, making it the perfect option for creating a “lived in”, vintage atmosphere.
Given the impressive strength and resilience of strand woven bamboo, refinishing is rarely necessary—but in the occasion that it does, it can be refinished without losing its color (unlike stained hardwood). This is an important distinction: whereas stained flooring can only achieve the desired look with the use of chemicals, in contrast, the color of carbonized bamboo is achieved with non-toxic, high pressure heating methods.
The benefits of choosing Ambient’s carbonized bamboo floors go beyond style and substance. It’s a non-toxic, kid, pet, and high heel friendly flooring alternative that lets you live and enjoy your life without the constant worry and hassle of complicated maintenance.
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