Linoleum - Uniclic Plank Floors










All natural composition of: wood and cork flour, linseed oil, natural pine resins, and pigments. Back in style for home dιcor & design because it’s eco-friendly, made from natural products; antibacterial; biodegradable; naturally fire retardant; emits no harmful pollutants; warm and comfortable under foot. Read more about Linoleum at the bottom of page.

Made of all natural ingredients including cork and wood flour, linseed oil, pine resins, jute, and natural pigments... Da Vinci linoleum floors are similar to the same flooring your grandmother used to have. Linoleum had temporarily taken a back seat to inexpensive, imitation, petroleum based vinyl flooring. The exceptions being that the colors are more vibrant than ever and installation has been simplified with a floating click lock system.

Long gone are the days of needing a certified installer to provide professional results. No welding rods are necessary, no rolling, no glue, and no toxic off gassing is associated with this product.



THE HISTORY OF LINOLEUM In 1860, rubber manufacturer Fredrick Walton invented linoleum the floor covering used in Victorian homes. Three years later, Walton received an English patent for linoleum. Walton was inspired to invent linoleum as a cheap substitute for a more expensive rubber composition called Kamptulicon. He got the idea from observing the skin on oxidized linseed oil that forms on paint.

Linoleum is made of linseed oil, pigments, pine rosin and pine flour. Linoleum is manufactured by oxidizing linseed oil and adding the other ingredients to form a thick mixture called linoleum cement. The name linoleum comes from the Latin word, linum, which means flax, and oleum, which means oil. Linoleum was later replaced in popularity by vinyl floor coverings of the 1960s.
Linoleum Lives On. (article from This Old House)

Linoleum makes a comeback and proves it's not what you think. by Cynthia Sanz

For linoleum makers, it's something of a bittersweet joke: A man walks into a flooring store and says he wants to buy linoleum for his kitchen. No problem, says the store clerk. Over here we have all kinds of vinyl flooring.
"It's amazing," says Frank O'Neill, publisher of Floor Focus magazine. "Even dealers you'd think would know better use vinyl and linoleum interchangeably." In truth, the two couldn't be more different. Where vinyl flooring is a synthetic product made of chlorinated petrochemicals, linoleum is produced from all-natural ingredients. Where vinyl will melt if a lighted match or cigarette lands on it, linoleum can't. And where most vinyl patterns are printed into the surface, linoleum's colors go all the way through. "As linoleum wears, different layers of color are gradually revealed," says Duo Dickinson, an architect in Madison, Connecticut, who has also used the material on backsplashes and countertops. "It can be quite beautiful." Durability is another of linoleum's attributes; some floors have survived 30 to 40 years in tough commercial environments. "It seems to last forever," Dickinson says.

Amazingly, linoleum's makeup and manufacture have hardly changed since an Englishman named Frederick Walton patented the product in 1863. The story goes that he got the idea from the leathery skin of oxidized linseed oil that forms on paint. Walton eventually perfected a mix of linseed oil, cork dust, wood flour, tree resins, ground limestone, and pigments — the same recipe used by linoleum makers today — and figured out how to press it onto a jute backing. Then he gave his concoction its name, combining the Latin words for flax (linum), the source of linseed oil, and oil (oleum).

Made in sheets, tiles, or even decorative area "rugs" and stuck to the floor with adhesive, linoleum became a favorite floor covering in stores, restaurants, and kitchens, where its smooth, water-resistant surface made cleaning less of a chore. But, when cheaper vinyl flooring became available in 1947, people began turning away from drab, old-fashioned linoleum. Says Frank O'Neill: "Frankly, it looked pretty lousy."

But now linoleum is surging back. The Dutch linoleum maker Forbo Industries, which holds 90 percent of the $40 million U.S. linoleum market, has seen sales jump by more than 30 percent over the last two years. Domco, a Canadian maker of vinyl flooring, plunged into linoleum in 1997 in response to requests from architects and specifiers. That same year, in what many see as the surest sign of linoleum's renewed popularity, vinyl-flooring giant Armstrong bought the world's second-largest linoleum maker, DLW (Deutsche Linoleum Werke), reentering a market it had left for dead in the 1970s.

Why the renewed interest? Color, for one thing. Today, linoleum comes in a Crayola™ box of vibrant hues, a far cry from the muddy offerings available before World War II. And new factory-applied sealer coats protect those colors against dirt and stains.

No matter what its color, a growing number of architects and designers regard linoleum as "green," environmentally friendly flooring. "From a resource standpoint, it's great," says Environmental Building News editor Alex Wilson, who last year installed a linoleum floor in the kitchen and bath area at the newsletter's offices in Brattleboro, Vermont. "It's made from natural, largely renewable, materials, and there are no environmental toxins involved in its manufacturing or disposal."

It's also a natural choice for vintage houses. Dean and Lauren Gallant — owners of a 93-year-old house in Belmont, Massachusetts, that This Old House renovated in 1993 — put linoleum in their laundry room, mudroom, and one of the bathrooms. "The original butler's pantry had it, and it was still in reasonably good shape," says Dean Gallant. "So we said, 'Well, if it lasted that long, why not do it again?'"

In 1877, fourteen years after his patent on linoleum flooring, Frederick Walton used essentially the same ingredients to come up with a durable wall covering stuck to a paper backing. Called Lincrusta, its heavy, crisply embossed rolls and panels found a place in many middle-class houses both as faux-plaster friezes, inserts, and as highly decorative dadoes. The British manufacturer still uses the original brass and iron rollers to create the elaborate patterns — from restrained Regency swags to florid Victorian foliage. Lincrusta goes up like wallpaper but requires special care because of its weight and thickness. Once up, it also needs two coats of oil-based paint to seal the surface and disguise the seams.
- Romy Pokorny

Linoleum spans the color spectrum. One company makes sheets and tile in 147 different shades, both marbled and solid.

There's another reason for linoleum's comeback: novelty. Dennis O'Brien, Armstrong's vice president of marketing for residential flooring, says, "I think what's old is new again. Just as the Volkswagen bug is back, so is linoleum."

Of course, linoleum does have its drawbacks. Because it's porous, its appearance and continued resilience depend on regular maintenance. Walt Bamonto, owner of Merlin Flooring in Farmington, New York, advises that new floors be given one or two coats of acrylic sealer and a recoat once a year after that to keep them looking fresh. Also, newly laid linoleum floors have a pronounced linseed-oil scent. This dissipates in a matter of months but, during that time, certain people are bothered (sometimes because of an allergy) by the oil's fatty acids. Even so, retail stores, day-care centers, and hospitals remain prime buyers of the flooring because of its natural bactericidal qualities.

In the view of interior designer Sue Walling of SW Design Inc. in Minneapolis, linoleum's many pluses outweigh its minuses, particularly in kitchens. "Ceramic tiles can be hard on your legs, and some people are nervous about having wood flooring around dishwashers," says Walling. "Linoleum is comfortable, you can get it wet, and you don't have to worry about dropping knives on it, the way you do with most vinyl." (To make a gash in linoleum disappear, fill it with a mix of wood glue and fine scrapings off a leftover piece.) Walling admits, however, that clients are often reluctant to go with linoleum, even though sheet linoleum costs about the same as vinyl sheet flooring — $3 to $4 per square foot installed — and remains a bargain compared to ceramic tile or wood. She thinks their reluctance stems from perceptions anchored to the past, which may explain why more than 90 percent of the material sold in the United States today winds up on commercial, not residential, floors. But those perceptions seem to be changing. According to Walling, "Once you show people what linoleum looks like and how it holds up, they really love it."

To turn liquid linseed oil into a floor covering durable enough to withstand decades of shoe scuffs and dog toenails, linoleum manufacturers still follow Frederick Walton's original recipe: Stir melted tree resin into a tank of boiled linseed oil heated to 175 degrees Fahrenheit. Alternately heat and cool the tank until its contents turn into a sticky viscous paste called linoleum cement. Extrude in a thick pasta like strand, then cut, cool, and store in chalk-dusted iron boxes. Blend the dry ingredients — wood flour, powdered cork, pigments, and powdered limestone — and mix with the linoleum cement in a series of double-screw extruders, or "sausage makers." Heat this mixture; then feed into the colanders, pairs of powerful rollers that flatten the raw linoleum onto a jute backing and create the desired pattern. Now hang the sheets, each about 5 miles long, in a 160-to-195-degree seasoning room, and wait two to four weeks for them to toughen. Finally, seal the porous surface with an acrylic finish.
-Romy Pokorny