Joanna Gaines Shares A Creative Flooring Hack To Make Your Small Space Stand Out

There are plenty of hacks to make a small place feel bigger without actually expanding the square footage. You can add vertical storage, use specific types of paint and wallpaper, and find the perfect size rugs, and all of these little tricks will result in your small rooms feeling a whole lot roomier. But HGTV star Joanna Gaines, host of the hit show "Fixer Upper" since its premiere in 2013, shared a creative flooring hack to make your small space stand out. She used some flooring panels on the lower part of a wall to essentially extend the floor further, adding spaciousness to a tight floor plan. 

Gaines implemented this specific "Fixer Upper" design that makes sense for small spaces all the way back in 2018 on a Season 5 episode of the show. She and her husband, Chip Gaines, had taken on the project of renovating a tiny home for a younger man to live in, and the couple had to pull out all the stops when it came to making the super-small home feel livable. As such, the flooring hack had its time to shine. "To make a small space like this feel like its own, rather than a part of a great room, try carrying the flooring — whether it be tile or wood — up onto the wall like we did here," Gaines wrote in a blog post about the episode. The chic wood paneling went up the kitchen wall, creating an expanding effect for the tiny home. 

So, what kinds of flooring should you actually use in this hack? The answer is just about anything you want. For the task of renovating the tiny home in Season 5 of "Fixer Upper," Joanna Gaines said she used wood tiling. "I love wood floors, but they do come with a little upkeep, so I decided to go with tile floors that look just like wood," Gaines wrote in her blog. "I definitely suggest using them if you want to achieve the same look as wood but you have pets, small kids, or if it's in a high traffic area then they're easy to clean and very durable." Options like the Daltile wood porcelain floor and wall tile from Home Depot are great matches with Gaines' choice, and retail for under $2 per square foot, which is significantly less than hardwood floors, which typically cost more than $5 per square foot, not including installation fees. 

Other wood alternatives include vinyl and laminate planks, which offer the same "best of both worlds" options including resilience and affordability with an organic wood look. You can compare wood alternatives like luxury vinyl plank versus engineered hardwood versus laminate to find what's best for your own home based on potential foot and pet traffic, and select a shade or stain that feels the most suitable for the room you're designing.