Chevron vs Herringbone Melbourne | Pattern Floors

People ask us for "that angled wood floor" and mean one of two different patterns. The words get used interchangeably, and the difference is worth two minutes of your time because it changes how the room reads.

This guide explains chevron and herringbone plainly, then covers every pattern floor and oak range we stock from Australian Select Timbers — the brand we hold more of than any other, at 32 ranges across engineered oak, hybrid and laminate.

Chevron and herringbone are not the same pattern#

Herringbone uses rectangular planks laid at a right angle to each other, with the end of one plank meeting the side of the next. The join makes a staggered, broken zigzag. Look down at it and you see a series of interlocking L shapes.

Chevron uses planks cut at an angle on both ends, so two planks meet point-to-point in a clean V. The joins line up into continuous unbroken stripes running down the room.

The practical difference:

Herringbone reads as busier and more traditional. The broken join gives it texture and it hides small variations in the timber well.
Chevron reads as calmer and more contemporary. Because the Vs line up into stripes, chevron visually lengthens a room in the direction those stripes run.

Chevron also costs more to make and more to lay, because every plank needs an angled cut and the installer has to keep the V points meeting exactly. If a quote for chevron looks the same as one for straight planks, ask what has been left out.

Which one suits your room#

Pick chevron if the room is long and you want to emphasise that length, or if the look you are after is modern and calm. Chevron suits hallways and open living areas particularly well.

Pick herringbone if you want the classic parquet look, if the room is squarer, or if you want a floor that carries some visual texture of its own.

Pick straight planks if the room is small. Both patterns need floor area to be read as patterns at all — in a small bedroom the effect is mostly lost and you have paid for cutting you cannot see.

One more practical point for Melbourne apartments: both patterns need a flat subfloor, more so than straight planks, because the eye picks up a misaligned V immediately. Our guide to body corporate flooring rules covers the approval side of apartment installs.

The pattern floors Alpha stocks#

Five pattern ranges, four in real engineered oak and one waterproof:

GrandOak Chevron — 7 colours, true chevron in engineered oak. This is the range to look at first if chevron is what you want.
GrandOak Herringbone — 10 colours, the widest pattern choice we hold
Coastline Herringbone — 6 colours
Regency Herringbone — 2 colours
Empress Hybrid Herringbone — 6 colours, and the one to choose if the room gets wet, because it is hybrid rather than timber

That last point matters more than it sounds. If you want a pattern floor in a kitchen or a family bathroom, the Empress hybrid gets you the herringbone look with waterproof performance. Our waterproof flooring guide explains why that trade-off exists.

Who Australian Select Timbers is#

Australian Select Timbers is an Australian flooring supplier. Their own site is at australianselecttimbers.com.au if you want to read about the company directly.

For a Melbourne buyer the relevant fact is depth in oak. We hold 32 ranges from them:

Engineered timber — 23 ranges, 172 colours
Hybrid — 5 ranges, 46 colours
Laminate — 3 ranges, 34 colours
Hybrid herringbone — 1 range, 6 colours

That is more engineered oak choice than any other brand on our floor, which is why this brand comes up in most of our oak conversations.

The GrandOak family: engineered oak, six ranges#

GrandOak is the core engineered-oak line and it runs widest:

GrandOak Noble — 19 colours, the largest single range we hold from this brand. Start here if you are matching an existing floor.
GrandOak Herringbone — 10 colours
GrandOak Monarch — 8 colours
GrandOak Chevron — 7 colours
GrandOak Regal — 7 colours
GrandOak Everest — 6 colours

Between them, Noble and Monarch cover most of the colour requests we get for European-look oak.

The other oak and hickory collections#

Beyond GrandOak, the engineered range divides into collections:

Coastline 190mm — 18 colours, wide 190mm boards. Wide boards suit larger rooms; in a small room they read as oversized.
Hickory Classique — 15 colours, and Hickory Homestead — 15 colours. Hickory has more grain variation and more colour movement than oak, so it hides wear well.
Aurora European Oak — 10 colours
Artistry Insignia Oak — 8 colours, plus Cabella, Couture and Designer in the same Artistry collection
Montvale — 8 colours
Regency Imperial — 4 colours, plus Eco Smart, Infinite and Hinterland in the Regency collection
Opulence Native 136 — 5 colours, and Native 180 at 3

All 23 engineered ranges are on the brand page if you want to browse rather than read.

Hybrid: Kodiak, Empress and the acoustic ranges#

Hybrid is the waterproof choice — the one for kitchens, laundries, bathrooms and busy family homes.

Kodiak Hybrid — 16 colours, the hybrid people ask for by name most often
Nouvelle Acoustic European — 10 colours, and Nouvelle Acoustic Australian — 8 colours. The acoustic ranges are built with noise transfer in mind, which is why they come up constantly for apartments where the owners corporation sets a sound rating. Our acoustic underlay guide covers how the underlay works with them.
Empress Hybrid — 6 colours
Kodiak Lite — 6 colours

Laminate: the three Reflections ranges#

Reflections GenCore+ — 14 colours
Reflections Lifestyle — 11 colours
Reflections Evoke — 9 colours

Laminate is the budget-conscious choice and suits bedrooms, rentals and investment properties. Our investor's guide covers what actually lasts between tenancies.

How to choose, and see it at our Docklands showroom#

A short way through 32 ranges:

Want a pattern floor? Chevron means GrandOak Chevron. Herringbone gives you four options — GrandOak Herringbone for choice, Empress Hybrid Herringbone if the room gets wet.
Want real oak, widest colour choice? GrandOak Noble at 19 colours.
Large room, want wide boards? Coastline 190mm.
Apartment with an acoustic requirement? The Nouvelle Acoustic ranges.
Room gets wet? Kodiak Hybrid first.
Budget is the main constraint? The Reflections laminates.

On prices: they are on the individual range pages, not here. Each range is priced by colour, board width and the size of the job, so one number in a guide would mislead you. Follow any link above, or ask us for a written quote.

Pattern floors in particular are hard to judge from a screen — a chevron photographed at an angle looks nothing like a chevron underfoot in a real room. Our showroom is at 351 Docklands Dr, Docklands VIC 3008, open Monday to Saturday 9am–5pm. Bring your room measurements and the direction the room runs; with chevron, which way the stripes point is a decision worth making in person.