Eco-friendly flooring options

jumblejulia

Hello,
My partner and I are about to move into our first home. The carpet in the livingroom is in a very bad state and needs replacing. We want to replace the carpet with a hard floor for two main reasons: 1) the front door opens straight into the living room and I can only imagine the carpet getting dirty very quickly, and 2) I've got a mild allergy to wool.
We're both keen to get a flooring type that is reasonably environmentally-friendly, and we've thought about cork and reclaimed wood. The house is quite cottagey and old, but underneath the carpet downstairs it's just concrete.
I've read that you should only get wood flooring if you have a cavity underneath as the boards need to breathe. Is this correct info, and if so does this mean we have to rule out floorboards completely?
We are very stuck, and I can't find any decent advice online. I'm particularly looking for more info on reclaimed wood flooring, as it seems so expensive! Does anyone know a good source? We're in Buckinghamshire.
Thanks in advance for your help

Jem8472

I have seen before on sites that do flooring saying that bamboo is quite enviromentally friendly. Seeing as it grows very quickly so is quick and easy to replace unlike normal trees.

I also really like the look of some bamboo flooring

hebridean

As your front door opens directly into your living room, within a year or two of laying the wood it will look awfull. Full of scratches and scrapes from allsorts caught in the shoe treads of people entering the room. You mentioned that there was concrete under the carpet and that the house is quite cottagey, then natural stone tiles/slabs would be a durable alternative with the option of a rug towards the living area away from the doorway.

pawpurrs

Reclaimed boards from a reclamation yard? Would be the obvious choice in a cottage, and being second hand its a lot more enviromentally friendly as you are recycling.
Or how about natural flooring such as seagrass, coir, mountain grass, sisal etc?