Custom Finishing

We ❤ Custom Projects !

In addition to offering oil and waterbased finishes and stains, we also offer custom bespoke wood floors. We have the experience and innovation to create an almost endless variety of options to meet nearly any architectural specification. Let us be your trusted partner in creating a floor that will fit seamlessly with your design. With the right collaboration we can assist you in achieving design excellence.

Innovation is a core value for our company and we are continuously exploring new finishing techniques as well as studying the processes of old wood workers and finding ways to take these techniques and apply them to an entire wood floor. Our obsession with pushing the norm with wood floor finishing techniques allows us to push the physical limits of design.

We have worked with countless architects, designers, builders, contractors, commercial clients and homeowners to help them realize their vision. With our finishing expertise and your vision the possibilities for custom floors are endless.

Our custom finishing techniques include the following:

Custom fuming, smoking & creative effects

Fuming – $1/sf

Fuming is an application to wood floors that creates a special graying effect through a tannic acid reaction. We are able to do this to both new and existing flooring. This gray color that this process creates makes for a great color for the floors, or it can act as an undertone for other stains or hardwaxes to be applied on top of it which can create a textured look with certain colors, or can create an amazing depth of color with other colors. We’re able to fume even low tannin woods via a special tannin treatment done prior to fuming. We are also able to adjust the extent of the fume so we can make the wood take on a subtle gray, or a very deep almost charcoal colored grey.

This floor was done for a client that wanted to get rid of the “golden oak” look of her Red Oak Floors. We re sanded these floors and then treated them with a fume treatment (to get the grey undertone), we then finished them with a matte subtle white non toxic european hardwax oil, this gave the floor a nice textured look.

Wirebrushing – From $1.99/sf

Wire brushing is a process that involves brushing the entire surface of your new or refinished floors to create a textured/ distressed look. We’re able to wire brush the entire surface of wood floors with our specialty wire brush machines. When coupled with our many other pretreatments, precolors, stains, dyes, and hardwax oils a wire brushed floor can take on an amazing contrasting color or ceruse look.

Rhodes Hardwood is the only hardwood flooring company in the state of MN that offers wirebrushing services for new and refinished floors!

Bleaching – $1.99/sf

Bleaching is the process of applying a bleach that is specifically made for wood. This pretreatment provides a mild whitish color to many different wood species. It’s applied in very thin layers so we can really dial in the extent of the bleached look. The bleach floor can then be the finished look, or it can be used to drown out the red tones in woods like red oak.

Bleaching is often used an as alternative to staining in the first step of antiquing or pickling projects, whether you are working with hardwood floors or furniture.

Ebonizing – From $1/sf

Ebonizing is a process that grays or blackens certain woods. This process is achieved through a natural reaction between a proprietary solution we have perfected and the tannins that are naturally present in certain woods. We can get different looks from gray to black with the process based on the mixture we use and the intensity of the reaction. Ebonizing makes for a very unique way to color a wood floor!

Ebonizing can act as an undertone for other hard wax oils or stains to be applied over. This can create textured looks, and custom hardwood looks with lots of color depth. Contact us today for more information!

Wood Lye From $1/sf

Wood lye treatment is a non-corrosive form of bleaching or graying woods. This mild solution is made from a small amount of the type of lye that soap is made from. This can create a bleached or aged driftwood sort of look. Our custom lye blends can be top coated with any of our finishing products; waterbed finish, oil based, or hardwax oils.

Smoke Treatment – $1/sf

Smoking is another tannic acid reaction. Smoked floors take on an aged sort of patina. We are able to finish floors that have been smoked with either a clean polyurethane or hardwax, with a stain (if you want color with a lot of depth), or with a colored hardwax for a more textured look. As with our fume, we are also able to adjust the extent of the smoke effect from a mild (very light tan/brown lightly aged look) to a deeper/darker brown aged look.

This image shows examples of smoked woods, with various colors of hardwax applied over each one. Options include untreated, untreated wire-brushed, smoked, pure (clear) oil, white oil and castle brown oil.

Pre Color Treatments – From $1.99/sf

Rubio Monocoats Precolor product is a waterbased coloring product similar to a deeply pigmented stain or dye. When combined with our many pretreatments and wide range of hardwax oil colors these colors can serve lots of different purposes. They can serve as the main color for a floor, they can have colored hardwaxes applied over them for contrasting color or ceruse look, the white shades can be used to drown out pink tones in red oak prior to using a white finish and much much more. When combined with all of our other custom finishing techniques, the options for colors and looks is literally endless.

Pre-color treatment options including untreated, pre-color black, black oil, smoke oil and charcoal oil.

Pre-color treatment options including untreated, pre-color dark brown, chocolate oil, vanilla oil, and 5% white oil.

Cerusing – From $2.99/sf

Cerusing is an old finishing technique that was used years ago by furniture builders and finishers. This is a textured or 2 toned look that is achieved by wire brushing certain woods (to scrape out some of the soft grain) then staining or dying the floors and then filling in the soft grain with a different color.

Rhodes Hardwood offers a variety of cerusing color combinations including black with white grain, gray with white grain, white with black grain, and more!

Pricing Information

NOTE: Prices listed for custom finishing services are costs that are an addition to our normal service. For example if you were refinishing your floors and you wanted to fume them you would have our normal cost for refinishing + the cost of fuming.

For more information on pricing, please use the links below or contact us by Email.