Anderson exotics: Guilt-free flooring

However, many of these exotic species come from trees that grow in ever-shrinking equatorial forests, including rain forests.

Now most flooring manufacturers buy wood only from sustainable sources, including tree-farm plantations, but it's still hard not to feel an occasional pang of guilt when traipsing across a Brazilian cherry floor. That is, until now.

Anderson Hardwood Floors, a South Carolina flooring manufacturer, recently developed an entire line of beautiful exotic wood-engineered floors that don't pose threat to even a single endangered or over-harvested tree.

The secret behind Anderson's Exotic Impressions line is that the flooring is milled out of domestic, abundantly available hardwoods, such as maple, birch and hickory, which are then stained and finished to mimic many of the world's most beautiful exotic woods.

For example, the stunning hand-scraped floor shown above is called, Afromosia Brown and it's a dead ringer for rare--and very expensive--African teak. But, the 4 1/2-inch-wide flooring is actually milled from North American hard maple.

Exotic Impressions include both classic, or smooth-surfaced, floors ($7.99 per square foot) and rustic hand-scraped floors ($11.79 per square foot).

You can order up to four free flooring samples directly from the Anderson website.