ceramic, limestone, karndean??? which one?

cuffie

Kitchen floor advice please

I like the look of a tiled kitchen, but have been told as we have a suspended floor, there will be too much movement. Someone else has said will be ok if we have 9mm ply then the tile (10mm)....raises floor level by 2cm then....
Limestone - friend has this, has been sealed, yet she has splashed stuff on her floor that doesn't come out (same prob with ceramic tiles re the suspended floor?)
Karndean is the other option for us - we will prob have this in the hallway in the wood effect...don't want real wood as too much faffing with the expansion etc. If we had that in the hallway then floor level would be ok with the tiled look I want in the kitchen.
With 3 kids - if they drop something on the tiles/limestone floor, will it chip?
Other thread on here have mentioned Karndean denting and scuffing.
Can't have wood/wood effect karndean for the kitchen/dining area (too much wood going on with wood kitchen and wood in hallway).
Also, Karndean seems quite "uniform" to me - although it tries to look like tiles, it does look like a fake tile the way they are square and uniformly put down. I like the large oblong tiles yet Karndean (amazingly in my opinion) only do this in 2 of their designs.
I don't want to make an expensive mistake. I suppose in my heart of hearts I like the look of the large limestone tiles. But what do I do with the floor level if I had Karndean wood effect in the hallway (which will then go into the lounge). Blimey - this is gonna cost more than the kitchen itself!!!!!!
Thanks, as always, for all your help and advice. x

Andy_Hamilton

I looked at fitting different flooring in my bathroom and down stairs loo but decided upon Karndean. Because I had 5 months to look around, the exact tiles I wanted for both turned up on ebay. I got £240 worth of tiles for £32!!!
I like them to look like fake tiles but they are much warmer to walk on in the winter, real stone or tiles are very cold