The floor in the Foyer and Front Hallway is decorated with a design that emulates tile. The floor is covered with a canvas floor cloth that was painted by the staff at the Royal British Columbia Museum. Its colourful geometric pattern was typical in mid-nineteenth century homes. The ingrain carpeting on the stairs is made by Family Heir-loom Weavers from West Virginia. It's a hand loomed pattern similar to the original carpet pattern.
"Staircarpets give an air of great comfort and finish to a house; and a cottage should never be without one. ...When a parlour carpet does not cover the whole of the floor, there are various ways of disposing of the margin between it and the wall. Some recommend oilcloth, others baize, drugget, coarse broadcloth, or brown linen; for our part, we greatly prefer to any of these, painting that part of the boards of the floor which is not covered with the carpet, as the same colour as the woodwork of the room; taking care that the margin painted shall exceed in breadth by a few inches the space which it is intended to leave uncovered. This is by far the best mode in staircases... it also saves a great deal of the most disagreeable part of the woman's household labours."
(John Cludius Loudon, An Encyclopaedia of Cottage, Farm, and Villa Architecture (1833): reprinted in abridged form in Furniture for the Victorian Home, Watkins Glen, N.Y.: Library of Victorian Culture, The American Life Foundation and Study Institute, 1978), p. 130.)
Much of the flooring in the house is wood, shown by the picture to the left. Originally, rooms such as the Parlour and Dining rooms had wall to wall Brussels carpeting with borders along the walls, but the rooms do not have that today. Other rooms, such as the bedrooms, had scatter rugs that Emily may have wove herself, or grass mat covers.
Click on the small images below to view the floor during early renovations.
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