Fake 196

Another fake to join the small collection of floor coverings masquerading as something else. For two others see references 2 and 3.

To be fair, this one works well enough as a floor covering, in the newish Ashley Centre Surgery - but it is given away by at least three features.

First, the colour is a bit odd for wood. Not quite right for lime wash, a lot less right for natual.

Second, the joints between the planks are improbably tight. Tongue and groove floor boards of the past would never look like this.

Third, we have mastic joints between the runs, visible more or less in the middle of the snap above. I passed the time trying to count the number of planks to the run by eye, without using any kind of marker to mark my place. A version of the game I used to play with the number of floors of tall buildings and the number of courses of bricks of big walls. Eventually, I reached a more or less stable count. I forget what the count was, perhaps 16 or17, but the runs were about 2 metres wide.

We also have the matter of the length of the planks. Should one fake the short planks that one buys in boxes from places like Wickes, or should one fake the much longer real floor boards of old?

PS 1: one should remember that the outsides of many buildings have decorative features which are fake, intended to evoke the past in one way or another. Or to create the impression of some expensive material. Or whatever. Faking is very pervasive, very much part of the architectural and decorative scene, in which it has a long and honourable history.

PS 2: according to Gemini, floor boards are pretty much history, and he tells a good story about why this should be so. And while Bing knows all about caberfloor, I do not propose to check Gemini any further on this occasion.

References

Reference 1: https://psmv6.blogspot.com/2026/02/fake-195.html.

Reference 2: https://psmv5.blogspot.com/2024/03/fake-175.html.

Reference 3: https://psmv5.blogspot.com/2023/08/fake-166.html.

Reference 4: https://uk.westfraser.com/our-products/caberfloor/.

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