Simple protectors to keep your floors safe from sofa feet, Floor material advice, Home style tips

Simple Protectors to Keep Your Floors Safe from Sofa Feet

18 January 2024

You have amazing furniture but what about the floor it sits on?  Is that sofa potentially damaging a beautifully stained real wood floor, or leaving your carpet with patchy holes?

Protectors to Keep Your Floors

Each time you sit down the furniture moves ever so slightly, and over time those small movements add up to scratches and other damage that requires a bigger and expensive effort to rectify. And of course that doesn’t fix the problem.

You just need to put a layer of protective material between your furniture leg and the floor.

Floor Furniture Protectors

Floor furniture protectors are brilliant for safeguarding your floors from scratches, dents, and scuffs caused by the movement of furniture. They come in a range of types including felt pads, rubber caps, or sliders. They all do the same job, though. They provide a barrier between your furniture and the floor surface.

These protectors not only shield your floors but also facilitate easy movement of furniture without causing damage, making them an inexpensive yet effective solution for preserving your floors’ appearance.

Often furniture comes with simple floor protectors that stick to the underside of your chair and sofa feet. Peel off the backing of the protector, and firmly attach it to the bottom of each leg. However these are not always high quality and easily become puckered by simply putting the furniture into place for the first time.

Floor protectors are a simple project and one that you can do at home yourself.

Types of Protection

You may choose something more hardwearing or thicker for example than what came with the furniture, or that you can buy online.

You can also choose the colour of the material so it matches the colour of the leg. This way your protection will be less conspicuous and not detract from the look of the furniture. You can also create custom shapes to match your legs exactly.

Felt Furniture Protectors

Super easy to make, felt is perhaps the most commonly found furniture protector. Just buy some sticky-backed felt online, place the felt under the leg and draw round the shape of the leg. It’s best to draw round each leg individually and keep that patch of material for that leg.

You could also use a thin card to create a template that you then cut out and copy to the felt. Choosing an adhesive backed felt means when you won’t have to stick and glue the felt to the chair. There’s less chance of damaging your furniture this way too.

Once all the pads are in place, carefully place the furniture without sliding it into position, and then sit on it to allow the pads to settle and stick. Felt is usually ok if you don’t move the furniture too much.

Leather and Foam Floor Protectors

Leather is one of the most abrasive-resistant materials available, hence its use in safety clothing for things such as motorbikes, where protection from sliding abrasions is vital.

The process is much the same for other materials such as leather, faux leather or suede. These more robust materials (particularly leather) will probably need a stronger glue to keep the pad in place.

While this provides a permanent bond, it will also likely leave a permanent mark on t eh furniture too.

Even worse, if the glue spills out it can damage the floor too.

Regular sponge foam won’t work, but craft foam is denser and can work as a protector… although you might find all those bold and bright craft colours are the biggest challenge in matching something suitable to your furniture.

Plastic and Rubber

That red skimmed milk carton lid might not suit the cabriole leg you have in your front room, but they do work to protect your floor.

The rubber ends on metal chairs tend to wear through, so check regularly that this isn’t happening on yours. Otherwise, the metal that is usually underneath the rubber can start to damage the floor. It might be possible to remove the rubber and use something like a coin to stop this happening,

Final Thoughts

Replacing or fixing floor protectors on your furniture is far easier than the cost and effort of having a wooden floor sanded and refinished. Or replacing a new carpet. You only need a few simple tools to make your own. There’s also a wide range in stores, which may be able to be cut to size if you have a particularly tricky shaped furniture leg. It’s worth a try.

Comments on this guide to Simple Protectors to Keep Your Floors Safe from Sofa Feet article are welcome.

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