Why Do Stone Effect Luxury Vinyl Tiles Look So Realistic?

Natural materials are a hugely popular interior design option, with hardwood and polished stone being particularly striking when used in modern minimalist offices.

However, neither is necessarily the best option from a practical standpoint, and this means that many businesses and office managers will need to either find ways to mitigate these issues or look for more practical alternatives.

One of the best options that balances affordability with practicality, versatility and long-lasting beauty is luxury vinyl tiles (LVT) that can provide an authentic stone effect.

This incredible result is thanks to decades of manufacturing evolution, design innovation and meticulous research, but to understand why these lengths were necessary, we must also discover why alternatives to stone flooring are even needed.

Why Is Stone Flooring Not Always An Option?

Stone, and to a lesser degree hardwood, are somewhat limited in where they can be used in modern commercial buildings, and whilst they will always have a place where money and practicality are no object, not every building can afford that level of indulgence.

Particular types of hardwood and especially polished stone or marble can be expensive, not just to buy but also to maintain. They can be surprisingly difficult to maintain a perfect finish and often require frequent sealing to remain at their best. They also require a painstaking professional installation.

Beyond this, solid stone flooring is not necessarily the most practical choice. Without effective sound dampening and sound mitigation, footsteps can be particularly loud and echoing, which means that certain types of workforces that require a quiet area to focus or make calls find that doing their job is far more difficult.

It also may not necessarily be comfortable to walk on and can provide a slip hazard.

Beyond all of these reasons why a business might not want to consider stone flooring, sometimes it is simply not possible to safely install a stone floor.

Stone is a particularly heavy material and needs a strong enough structure to be laid onto a floor without causing it to warp. By contrast, some stone flooring materials can weigh up to 7kg per square foot, 15 times the weight of an equivalent vinyl tile.

Most buildings can safely do so, but having to confirm this with the help of a structural engineer can add yet another cost to an expensive surface.

Does Stone Effect Vinyl Look The Same?

Because of all of this, stone-effect vinyl becomes a particularly tantalising option. It is designed to deal with high-density traffic, is astonishingly hard wearing and is easily replaced if it does start to show its age.

This has been made possible in recent years thanks to state-of-the-art three-dimensional imaging and printing technology, which allows vinyl manufacturers to not only capture the basic elements of various types of stone, but even some of the depth, detail and finish that makes them so captivating.

The increasing prevalence, popularity and efficiency of production means that a wide range of stone-effect tiles are available as well, featuring a wide range of conventional favourites and exotic materials that may be impractical to have otherwise.

Part of what helps with the depth effect is the multi-layered approach LVT uses, consisting of a vinyl backing layer, a colour layer, the photographic film layer with the high level of detail people expect, alongside a top layer made from urethane or sometimes aluminium oxide.

Why Choose LVT Over Natural Stone?

The simple reason is that it provides the same look, but with far more practicality for the everyday use that it would see in an office or retail area.

It is warmer underfoot in general, but is crucially much more suitable for use with features such as sound-dampening underlay and underfloor heating, which can be a more efficient way to heat certain buildings, depending on the type of heating system they use.

As well as this, it is particularly easy to install, using a system of locking pieces that drastically reduces the amount of time it takes to install a complete floor.

Moreover, replacing individual parts of the floor that have become damaged over time is simply a matter of taking out the individual tile and replacing it with a like-for-like piece. Even this will likely take a decade or more before it becomes necessary.

Remarkably, they are even more resistant to scuffing and stains than stone flooring. Whilst stone will last an eternity, it will also show every single one of those years in chips, cracks and erosion unless it is carefully sealed. LVT already has a protective layer built into it.