In addition to the Majestic, Heritage and Newport Collections, Luzern offers complete and total flexibility through Custom Rug Creation. Take any of Luzern’s wall to wall patterns, and by adding a simple border, bring an elegance to any design in the shape of an area rug. Wall to wall designs will come alive with a new vibrancy, giving you the freedom to fit any pattern in any room the way you choose.
We have an array of examples of Luzern’s craftsmanship in our showroom.
Email, call 703-370-0000 or stop by to review them with us.
I’ve been convinced for years that to be green does not mean you have to fit any “granola” stereotype (although there is nothing wrong with Birks and bio-diesel). This hotel is just one more feather in the green-is-for-everyone cap. I’ve been seeing it in our clients’ requests for green luxury flooring and, as a LEED AP, am heartened by it.
But this is downright dreamy!
Pardon me whilst I swoon…
Here is a short breakdown of the credits achieved by the Montage team that led them to the project’s Gold certification:
Each project certified under LEED for New Construction V2.2 rating system earns credits for factors that are assessed by the USGBC against desired performance goals in six environmental categories.
Montage Beverly Hills earned a total of 39 credits in these environmental categories:
8 credits for Sustainable Sites, including offering public transportation access, bicycle storage and carpooling van parking for employees
1 credit for Water Efficient Landscape, installing an irrigation system that reduces potable water consumption by 54%
12 credits for Energy & Atmosphere, including selection of highly efficient heating, ventilation, air conditioning and refrigeration systems that minimize or eliminate emission of compounds that deplete ozone or contribute to global warming
5 credits for Materials & Resources, including effective construction waste management, use of recycled building materials and use of materials from within 500 miles of the project site
8 credits for Indoor Environmental Quality, including use of eco-friendly and low-VOC paints, sealants and adhesives; efficient lighting systems, and specific seasonal temperature and humidity controls that ensure personal comfort
5 credits for Innovation in Design, including adopting an Environmentally Preferred Purchasing Plan, locating all parking underground and developing a Green Housekeeping Program
And when you look at their website, the LEED information is quietly tucked away under the “Hotel Overview” tab. It’s not in-your-face, it’s quite classy as one would expect.
Christopher Moline, LEED AP
Residential Group Manager
Commercial Carpets of America
703-370-0000 EmailBlogFacebookTwitter
Sorona Smartstrand Fiber For Carpet – The Next Best Thing…
Below you’ll find information about this fascinating, soft and extremely-durable carpet fiber we’ve installed in our showroom for you to try out. Whatever your flooring needs, give us a call at 703-370-0000 or send an email. You’ll be glad you did!
Contact Chris Moline, LEED AP, our Residential Group Manager, for any flooring-related questions. Email
From the Mohawk site -
“Mohawk leads innovation in sustainable flooring with SmartStrand® carpet with DuPont™ Sorona® renewably sourced polymer. In a partnership withDuPont, this carpet exclusively offers fiber made with Bio-PDO™ (the key Sorona® ingredient), which is produced from corn sugar.
By utilizing this new ingredient, 37 percent of Sorona® is being made from renewable resources. This marks the first time that a luxuriously soft carpet offers durability and stain protection, while also making less of an environmental impact.
Why is this carpet environmentally smart?
DuPont™ Sorona® plays a major role in the worldwide objective of a renewable economy and represents a new frontier in sustainability. This carpet is environmentally smart because:
The production of Sorona® polymer requires 30 percent less energy than the production of an equal amount of nylon.
Greenhouse gas emissions from the production of Sorona® are 63 percent lower than nylon manufacturing.
This energy reduction results in approximately one gallon of gasoline saved per every seven square yards of carpet.
The superior stain resistance of SmartStrand® carpet is engineered into the fiber and will never wear or wash off, meaning consumers will never need to retreat the carpet with stain protectors after steam cleaning. And this engineered-in stain resistance reaches new levels of protection, allowing tough stains such as mustard, red wine, and cherry Kool-Aid® to be removed simply with warm water and a mild detergent, or with Mohawk FloorCare™ Essentials. The fiber even resists discoloration from bleach.”
At Alexandria Carpet One, we provide our customers with thousands of square feet of this wonderfully-soft, durable carpet each month. In fact, it’s on our showroom floor with 5 different types of cushion underneath to give you a real-world idea of what it will feel like with different cushions… and how it will hold up. That’s because our showroom is extremely busy and we chose to put it to the test.
It’s performing flawlessly!
Contact Chris Moline, LEED AP,
Not ashamed to be a tree-hugger!
our Residential Group Manager,
for any questions about
Sorona Smartstrand fiber
in your home or office! Email
by Chris Moline, LEED AP
This one sets the standard.
Check out the logos and keep an eye out for them in the future.
By the way, this was a brochure sent to my home regarding the 2009 Biodiesel Conference in San Francisco.
I wonder what the carbon footprint of the conference will be?
As an aside, since I’ve been onboard here, we’ve scaled back electricity usage by over 34 million watts/year just through replacing all showroom lighting with cfl’s.
It all just makes sense!
If you’re in the neighborhood, stop by our Alexandria showroom and walk through our green area. We’ve got everything from undyed wool carpet with natural latex back, to floating marmoleum flooring, cork, bamboo, fsc-certified wood, and more!
by Chris Moline, LEED AP
Had to post these stats. Commercial Carpets of America is a zero-landfill company.
Here is a calculation from a recent project…
Number of square yards reclaimed 18,440 Environmental Impacts
Equivalent # of pounds reclaimed 82,980
Cubic Yards of landfill saved 410
Average Equivalent BTU’s saved 829,800,000
# of avg. US homes that could supply for 1 Yr. = 5
Global warming potential averted (CO2 Equivalent lbs.) 580,196
Gallons of water saved 253,089
Note: This information is based on some life cycle analysis work done by
DuPont along with some assumptions developed through experience handling used carpet.
Some of these assumption are:
1) An average pile of mixed used commercial broadloom carpet weighs about 4.5 lbs per SQYD
and takes up approximately one cubic yard of space per 45 SQYD of carpet.
2) About one half the weight of used carpet is plastic face fiber versus backing adhesives and dirt.
3) The average US home uses 179,893,777 BTUs per year.
This is how seriously we take our commitment to the environment.
I sincerely enjoy discussing all matters “green” up to, and including, home-based production of biodiesel! Of course, we are a flooring company and biodiesel is my hobby. That said, if we can post and comment something that can help lower the overall carbon footprint we leave behind, then this blog will have served its purpose.
Not ashamed to be a tree-hugger!
Commercial Carpets of America, Inc. provides the military, federal government agencies and other public-sector clients with selection, design consulting, installation, and quality assurance that have come to define industry standards.
We have our own General Services Administration (GSA) contracts for carpet, linoleum, and rubber flooring and accessories and complete installation. CCA ranks in the top ten GSA Contractors that deal with flooring and installation. Military bases, BOQ, BEQ, DV Quarters, Super DV Quarters, Distinguished Vistitor Quarters. We also have term contracts with local government such as Alexandria & Arlington cities, and Fairfax, and Prince William Counties.
We offer a variety of broadloom carpet, carpet tile, and complete installation including Vertical Lift carpet installation for the modular workplace. Vertical Lift installation includes using special tools to lift existing modular systems furniture safely.
We’ve partnered with companies like Patcraft Commercial Carpet, Forbo linoleum, and Freudenberg/Nora rubber to offer our federal and state government clients fully-recyclable, environmentally compatible products. At CCA, our goal is to make your vision a reality.
If you are interested in any of the products, services, or contracts featured in the Government section, please feel free to contact Peter LePage, Manager, Government Group.
by Chris Moline, LEED AP
Darn, I blew it right off the bat.
Now you’re going to know something out-of-the-ordinary is about to come when I ask the question – Which floor type is better for people with allergies… carpet or hard-surface?
Well, a study by the German Allergy and Asthma Society appears to prove that levels of airborne fine dust are reduced (in places dramatically) by the use of carpeting.
In fact, according to the study, the average fine-dust concentration in hard-surfaced rooms is twice as high as in wall-to-wall carpeted rooms.
Hooey, you say? Me, too, until I dug deeper.
Because that’s when the engineers spelled it out. Carpet, apparently, binds dust in the fibers and backing, trapping it and preventing re-release into the air.
From my early years in the business I can attest to the fact that every time I pulled up carpet, I could see the dust fly… dust that would normally have remained on top of a hard-surface floor to be re-released into the air by foot traffic or the opening of a door. “…the average fine-dust concentration in
hard-surfaced rooms is twice as high as in
wall-to-wall carpeted rooms.” And that’s not accounting for the “filtration” effect evidenced by the presence of very-fine dust particles on the subfloor that had migrated through the carpet backing and pad.
I’m still a bit hesitant to completely say “amen”, but it really does make sense.
The study, or at least what portion of mind-numbing statistcs I’d read, didn’t mention IAQ in regards to VOC’s (Volatile Organic Compounds) and off-gassing. No one will ever convince me that vinyl is a healthy floor for someone with chemical sensitivities, but that’s another story.
I’ve told you what’s on my mind, now let me know what you think!
We have a complete section of our showroom dedicated to “green” flooring I’m sure you would find interesting. In fact, we have natural, undyed wool carpet with natural latex and jute backing, along with cork, bamboo, marmoleum… and that’s just the beginning!
Pad, padding, carpet underlayment, cushion… whatever you may choose to call it, it’s the unseen and often unsung hero of an excellent carpet installation.
If you’ve never bought carpet for a home, I’m glad you’re here.
If you have, and feel you were well-educated by your sales person, you are one of the fortunate few, my friend.
On my desk is a piece of yellow foam, 3/8 of an inch thick, masquerading as pad… and it’s bothering me. Of course, it is FHA base-grade pad and weighs in at a paltry sub-3-pound density… but that’s not the real story.
The real story is – tada! – that “pad” will void your warranty, no matter how excellent and well-thought-out your carpet choice. In fact, few sales people take the time to educate their customers in the area of the importance of pad.
Let’s go to the go-to resource, the Carpet & Rug Institute (CRI). They mandate that carpet cushion should be “no more than 7/16 inch thick and no less than 1/4 inch with 6 pounds per cubic feet density. If the carpet is a Berber or a low profile carpet, choose a cushion no more than 3/8 inch thick with 8 pounds density.” I couldn’t have said it any better myself, and I have, thousands of times over the years because it is so vital.
Check out this picture of what junk pad can do to good carpet:
Yuck!
And here is a close-up of the culprit:
Base-grade, foam pad ruined this carpet.
We do not sample that type of pad, but it is available, begrudgingly.
Our standards start at 6 pound and range through the most beautiful 22 pound slab rubber pad you’ve ever set your feet on. In fact, I have three wonderful, very active, children and you’ll find rubber pad in my basement! We take it very seriously and think you should, too. That’s why our professional sales staff will take the time to work with you to ensure you’ll be pleased with your choice years from now.
If you are in the neighborhood, stop by our newly-redesigned “Green Area” and take a walk on 40 yards of Sorona SmartStrand frisse carpet with five different pad types underneath. Come to think of it, by next week there will be six because I am going to put a small section of this… lovely… yellow… FHA base-grade foam down, just to make a point.
Feel free to email with any of your “pad” related questions and I’ll do my best to get you the best answer in a timely manner. I will be updating this post with much more in the coming weeks.
All the best!
Chris
Christopher Moline, LEED AP
Residential Group Manager
Commercial Carpets of America
703-370-0000 EmailBlogFacebookTwitter
And here is what Shaw has to say about pad:
Carpet cushion, or “pad,” is available in three basic types: foam, fiber, and rubber.
Each type of carpet pad has several different varieties and constructions. The type and thickness of cushion you need varies according to traffic levels and carpet patterns. Bedrooms and other areas with light or moderate traffic, for example, can use thicker and softer carpet cushion. Living rooms, family rooms, hallways, stairs and other heavy traffic areas require thinner and firmer cushion.
Consult your carpet dealer to help you decide the best carpet cushion for you.
The Carpet Cushion Council describes the three different types as follows:
Foam Carpet Cushion
Generally speaking, foam carpet cushion comes in three recognized, clearly different varieties:
Prime polyurethane foam is a firmer version of the same cushioning used in upholstered furniture, mattresses, and automobile seats. Two liquid ingredients are combined to form a large mass of foam, which is then sliced into sheets for use as a carpet cushion.
Bonded polyurethane foam (sometimes called rebond) is quite unique. You cannot mistake it when you see it, because it is formed by combining chopped and shredded pieces of foam, in different sizes and usually different colors, into one solid piece. It frequently has a surface net for ease of installation and improved performance.
Bonded foam is one of the most amazing recycling projects of all time. Nearly all the scrap foam in the U.S., and some from other countries as well, is utilized to make bonded cushion. This recycles waste which would otherwise be thrown out, and it eases the strain on our landfills. Moreover, bonded foam is itself recyclable.
Froth polyurethane foam is made with carpet backing machinery. Liquid ingredients are applied, either directly to the backs of some carpet styles, or to a non-woven material (for making separate cushion). They reach and form a thin, dense foam which is particularly useful in commercial applications with wide expanses of carpet.
Rubber Carpet Cushion
There are two basic types of sponge rubber carpet cushion:
Waffled rubber carpet cushion is made by molding natural or synthetic rubber. Heat cures the rubber and forms a waffle pattern. This variety produces a soft, resilient cushion whose luxurious feel is particularly useful for residences.
Flat sponge rubber is a firm, dense carpet cushion which has a flat surface and is normally used in large-scale commercial applications and with loop type (or Berber) carpet.
Rubber carpet cushion manufacturing processes can be varied to produce different levels of density and firmness. The usual measurement is the weight in ounces per square yard.
Fiber Carpet Cushion
Foam and rubber carpet cushions are produced from new and recycled materials. Fiber carpet cushion, on the other hand, uses existing fibers (both virgin and recycled, and either natural or man-made fibers) which are interlocked into a useful sheet of felt. There are two distinct varieties of fiber carpet cushion:
Natural fibers include felt, animal hair, and jute (the material used to make some kinds of rope and heavy burlap bags). This is one of the oldest types of carpet cushion, dating back to the earliest days of machine-made carpet.
Synthetic fibers include nylon, polyester, polypropylene, and acrylics, which are needle-punched into relatively dense cushions which have a firm feel and, as with other types of carpet cushion, can be made in virtually any weight, to stand up under light, medium, or heavy traffic, which is how they are usually classified.
Special Notes
Berber carpet is becoming increasingly popular, and needs a thin, firm carpet cushion. When buying this type of carpet, be sure that the accompanying cushion has been specified by the manufacturer as suitable for Berber carpet.
Radiant heating is becoming more widely used in certain sections of the country. In the case of radiant heating, you do not want a carpet cushion which is an exceptionally effective insulator, but one which allows the heat from the subflooring to penetrate the carpet system and heat the room. A relatively thin, flat cellular sponge rubber or synthetic fiber carpet cushion works well under these circumstances.
COMMERCIAL – Are you a facility manager looking to replace carpet, carpet tile, vct, porcelain, rubber, or linoleum flooring? We provide material and installation services nationwide to many commercial end-users. You won’t have to worry about whether or not we can do quality work… after 35 years, we’ve proven it and you’ll look good when you choose the CCA team.
GSA - Are you a government contract specialist looking to touch base with a GSA, TXMAS or AFNAF professional? You’ve found us!
Whatever your flooring needs, give us a call at 703-370-0000 or send an email. You’ll be glad you did!
Contact Chris Moline, LEED AP, our Residential Group Manager, for any flooring-related questions. Email
703-856-4929
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