Checkerboard Flooring

Carefully chosen antique, new and vintage flooring, while not usually considered a focal point, can play a huge role in designing how a space should look and feel.

Archaeologists have identified glazed brick tiles and polished stones on historic floors and other surfaces around the world. Some of the earliest known glazed bricks date to a 12th-century B.C. facade in Susa, in today’s Iran.

Whether you choose wide planks to contrast with your modern appliances in your farmhouse-style space or understated oak for a clean contemporary look, humble wood can play a starring role when it comes to flooring. Alternately, vintage tiles can be the “it” factor in your kitchen, bathroom, patio or bedroom. Gapless mosaics forming tessellations or complicated geometric patterns can provide a bold statement, and one doesn’t have to be polymath designer Gio Ponti, for example, to create dramatic floors with these tiles. (Ponti ​​was arguably the most important figure in 20th-century Italian architecture and design, and diagonally patterned floors, meant to make rooms more dynamic, were a signature of his.)

Modern 21st-century flooring and new and made-to-order flooring come in many styles. However, choosing antique or vintage flooring or a unique pattern from innovative designers like Aimee Wilder can add an extra layer of charm and sophistication to an interior or other space.

On 1stDibs, find flooring to match a range of styles and tastes.