How can I reuse or recycle laminate wooden flooring?

Laminate flooringWe’ve had an email from “The Hirst”:

We put wooden floor down and have about two boxes left over. The shop won’t taken them back because we opened all the packs by mistake and it’s not worth ebaying them because it would be enough for a full room or whatever. Can’t burn them because they’re MDF and laminate but I don’t want to just sling them into landfill. Any other options?

Don’t under estimate what people will buy on eBay – and to a greater extent, what people will use if given it on Freecycle. Two packs might be enough for a small bathroom or an narrow hallway.

If it was just a few slats though, and you didn’t want to keep them for spares, I bet you could do some fun things with them.

My father-in-love has mentioned people using it to make wood-effect table tops and I suspect there are loads of other places where you could use it in place of real wood in crafts/woodwork – it would create a strange but fun effect to have a number of different items in the same room (clocks, table-tops, coasters, picture frames, hell, pictures) made from the same pattern of wood.

Also, unless it’s really thick (and most of the laminate I’ve seen isn’t), it would make an awesome hardback cover for a notepad too.

Any other suggestions?

(Photo by Enoch Lai

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18 Responses to “How can I reuse or recycle laminate wooden flooring?”


  1. Bobbie says:

    It could be used on the walls as wainscotting or as backsplash in the kitchen or bath.

  2. Renee L says:

    Depending on how wide/thick it is, it could be used for a small shelf.

  3. Reiza says:

    We have the same problem–an almost full box of laminate that we’ve had for years. No idea what to do with it.

  4. Barbara says:

    Line cabinets, make furniture like stackable book cases, dog steps, table tops and legs if you are very creative, bed frames, toy boxes, and do keep a box for patch. Most laminates can get damaged in some way and many can not be sanded out.

  5. alex says:

    i’ll take it all, send it to me!!

  6. meme says:

    when we bought our home the wood inside the bathroom cabinet was rotted away, we used some leftover stuff to replace it. Its really nice actually, too bad we couldn’t move into the bathroom cabinet

  7. Susan says:

    I would save one box if you intend to stay there a long time. This flooring is not indestructible, and by the time you need to repair a section, the pattern you have will not be in the stores.

  8. Jane says:

    you could donate it to habitat for humanity

  9. Bad Monkey says:

    Make a set of placemats and coasters with it.

  10. Bad Monkey says:

    Make Chess/Checkers board out of it, cut the squares out and alternate the grain – some going 90 degrees to the other, then stick them all down on the other pieces of laminate as backing, and as checker pieces use plastic bottle tops.

  11. When my parents’ home underwent renovation and the old laminated hardwood floors of one of the rooms had to be removed, we got the carpenters to help us saw the floorboards into uniform lengths. We painted the boards with leftover paint and had the construction workers put up wall brackets in the storeroom so we could use the floorboards as shelves. It worked a treat. Now everything from bags of pet food to the cardboard recycling bins are off the floor, and we didn’t have to pay anything extra for our shelving system!

    • paul newton says:

      could lammingated flooring be grinded up and formed as a pellet and used as an oil resorbant

  12. Aileen says:

    I replaced some laminate floors and would like to recycle it if possible. It’s oak colored 4 ft slabs ( 50+ whole boards) and several odd cuts). Free to anyone who will pick it up. It was stored for about 2 years in a storage room on the back of my house. I had to take it out and it is on my patio, covered with plastic and is in real good shape. I’ll just put it out for the city to take it if no one wants to come by for it. My emai is lockhartab@earthlink.net.

  13. Richard Spurr says:

    Laminate flooring is great for routing / fine cut.
    I used some left overs to make a giant version of the disappearing coin trick .The ‘coins’ were made with a 2″ hole saw. I am currently making a 2′ puppet robot in acrylic but going to make an 8′ one in laminate that I will animate for next March science week at a school where I am a governor.

  14. Galina says:

    Cover with them a not so great table, storage boxes, create wooden sland around ceeling light fixture.



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