@ sally wastie....Would have loved those pine kitchen cupboards....before they were painted. Had I a strong yen for :a bit of colour"...(and I do love colour), I would have had a new glossy multi coloured counter top, probably something very striking and then oiled the pine cupboard doors There were no work benches in the kitchen of my 1920s all pine cottage ( always say that the kitchen was an afterthought since it is positioned just of a hallway and consisted only of a sink and a wood burning stove.) I built a small bench/table using VJ pine slats I'd removed from elsewhere and then put a thick pine top that curved out from the small straight bench to form a little round kitchen table..Then came the fun, I painted the benchtop and table a datk teale colour, gave it a flecked faux marble finish and a couple of coats of high gloss waterproof varnish. Nothing terribly amazing but it did give the old...'kitchen space' a bit of a lift. Had a larger round kitchen table with a formica top and timber legs...so gave the table-top the same teale treatment as the bench and it now lives on the veranda that came a few years later. Yes! Teale of any shade always looks good with timber. The only pity was that the kitchen walls and ceiling here were terribly smoke stained and had been painted a really horrible pre WWII green. Begrudgingly, I repainted the walls but used a bright orange/yellow to complement the dark teale colour ( this particular yellow is a good colour to keep the flies out) and, in keeping with the era of the house, I installed a built in dark timber kitchen hutch found at the dump shop. The kitchen is the only room to have been painted and repainted....but still have the dark timber parquetry floors. If you get tired of all timber a few splashes of bright colour in well-thought-out places do not go astray. If you have vertical timber panelled walls and you are feeling hemmed in... a good trick is to stain a small section of panels a darker wood colour or with a coloured stain to shift the focus from all the timber. or you can bleach the timber panels lighter. This idea can create interest extending ceilngward from behind a furniture piece...say low display cabinet...or just in a section of wall. You enhance the all timber 'look' with an eye -catching timber panel of another timber hue...like having a mahogany panel set in a light timber wall... Just a few ideas for those feeling a bit claustrphobic in an all timber house....understandable, not all of us aspire to live in a log cabin...but if carefully accented, an all timber interior can be extremely impressive and will not date. This is a pre-digital shot of the glass panels I had installed in the wall around my bed head...its really faded PIC but you can get the idea. Looks better today since the glass has been decoratively frosted with patterns. The sunroom behind the bedroomThis is also a pre-digital PIC showing the little timber kitchen bench with the teale table top. The end and other side of the bench is stained timber. This little table seats 3 or 4. Pity you can't see the old parquetry floor here. Old formica table given a lift with a Teale coloured painted top...there's no room for it in the ' kitchen space'. Amazing what a little lick of the right colour can do in an all timber house.

Hi, I had a Spotted Gum Timber Floor ( 10mm Real Solid Timber Single Planks ) in a penthouse apartment for 8 years . It was pre-coated in high gloss clear from the factory . When it was laid it was necessary to have a noise reduction 3mm foam under layer ( apartments underneath building noise requirement) . This method of installation actually made the floor very quiet and it also made it a little softer to walk over . When it got any scuff marks, they just easily wiped off with a damp cloth. When I sold the penthouse, the floor was in exactly the same condition as the day it was first laid - first class. It was only ever cleaned with a steam cleaner , no chemicals whatsoever . I would certainly recommend the pre-coated polyurethane gloss finish on the real timber planks to anyone, it was great ! You can just see a glimpse of the kitchen floor in the attached two images. Good luck with your specifying . High quality surface finishes normally stand the test of time . I have added a couple of extra images of the penthouse for interest. We did the interior design fit out after buying the shell from the developer. It was a stunning sky home . Cheers LAADP

The photo below is my suggestion for colour of floor. Furniture should be darker - similar to below. For the rug - choose one colour from the artwork and find a similar coloured rug. Don't put a mantle over the fireplace - it could be a health hazard - bumps and bruises. Blinds - unless you want them to make a statement I think white - to match window frames would be fine.

So is this just for the stair or for the actual flooring? Blackbutt will be more consistent and lighter. Spotted gum has more variation in colour. It's all natural product so it's next to impossible to see exactly/perfectly what it will look like, and the particular finish can make a difference too. But these two are quite different. Blackbutt is a lighter option closer to a Tasmanian Oak or Vic Ash in tone but much harder/denser, with a bit more character in it and much better for stairs than the softer hardwoods. This is Blackbutt: Spotted gum is much different has quite a distinctive/australian look to it as per below: Significant difference. Depending upon what adjacent flooring and also the stair design one or the other could work. It's about choosing the right one for your particular context. If you want an interesting/varied feature spotted gum could be the go, if it needs to be more understated and toned down then blackbutt could be the better option - good luck :) PD