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When shopping for new carpeting, one of the biggest decisions is light versus dark colored carpeting. Both lighter and darker carpets have their pros and cons in terms of appearance, durability, and maintenance required. Here’s what to consider when debating going lighter or darker when picking out fabrics and shades.

Visibility of Dirt and Stains

Darker carpets aesthetically hide stains, soil, crumbs, and pet hair much better overall. Lighter beige, cream or white carpeting shows every bit of dirt tracked inside a home, requiring far more frequent vacuuming to maintain appearance. Those opting for light carpets should expect to clean constantly to keep them appearing fresh, which becomes tedious.

Foot Traffic Wear

While darker carpets hide dirt better visually, lighter carpets inherently show less visible wear traffic patterns over time. The natural color variations in lighter fibers don’t show flattened nap lines and pathways quite as much. Dark carpets reveal “lighter” walkways clearly from fiber and dye abrasion after continuous walking back and forth across the same route indoors.

Kid and Pet Friendliness

For homes with multiple kids and pets, darker colored carpets are vastly more forgiving day-to-day. Stains blend in better when inevitable accidents happen until steam cleaning sessions. However, once stains do set into darker carpets from pets, food, or drink spills, they become harder to actually remove from darker dye colors which can be problematic.

Ease of Cleaning

Professional carpet cleaners ultimately find lighter carpets easier to deep clean and get them cleaner looking overall. With darker carpets, it’s harder to pre-treat spots adequately since stains are less visible. Dark carpets are also more prone to apparent “wick-back” staining later where hidden soil rises back up to surface levels over time, requiring more repeat cleaning.

Reflecting Natural Light

Lighter colored carpets, especially in soft white and cream palettes, bounce natural light around interiors beautifully. They give a brighter, airier feel to any room and make smaller spaces appear larger. Sun shining through windows glows warmer atop light carpet colors for a cozier ambiance. Dark moody carpets certainly make a dramatic design statement, but light carpets reflect light better.

Coordinating Design Elements

Consider your interior wood tones, painted wall colors, tile backsplashes, furniture palettes and overall decorating scheme. Lighter neutral carpets seamlessly coordinate with almost any color combo, from cherry cabinets to navy blue accent walls. But darker dramatic carpeting can beautifully ground a room and define a design concept, like charcoal grey carpets against white trim with black furniture accents.

Personal Lifestyle Factors

Those with pets who shed, younger kids, or clumsy wine drinkers gravitate predictably towards darker carpets to mask life’s messiness. White carpets require diligent protection and constant cleaning to maintain their sophistication. Active families may find the required maintenance exhausting. Ultimately lifestyle, personal design taste and realism about cleaning time direct ideal light or dark carpet decisions.

Final Words

In general, lighter carpets show signs of wear sooner but clean up renewed looking much easier long-term. Darker carpets withstand lively families better day-to-day but developing stains and traffic lanes appear quite visible over time with repeated cleaning. Assess your family, décor, and cleaning commitment to decide on light or dark carpeting that best fits your home.

No matter whether you want to buy dark carpets or light carpets, we make the process affordable for you. All you have to do is to shop for your carpets from us at Pay As You Go. Along with an instant credit of £600 and weekly payments of £10, you can easily afford those dream carpets. Anyone considering my dream flooring can buy pay monthly carpets from us today.