Having worked with leading cruise developers for more than 30 years creating custom-designed carpets to enhance the travel experience, Ege Carpets knows all the essentials for achieving a successful carpet installation in the marine interiors industry.

When choosing flooring for your marine project, there are many important factors to consider. These can include the weight of the flooring, the time it takes to order and install, how to install flooring in restricted spaces, and how sustainable your flooring choice is. This is becoming more important as the cruise industry moves towards a more circular economy.

Flooring is a major component in any marine interiors project. It has a critical impact on the overall interior in terms of look, feel, comfort, atmosphere and sound. But flooring also impacts a vessel’s safety, durability, maintenance, and sustainability. As such, your choice of flooring must be high performing to withstand heavy levels of traffic and wear and tear.

What are the options available for marine approved carpets?

With today’s broad range of flooring choices, what are the options for your particular marine project? When it comes to marine approved flooring, there are a number of possibilities. However, the choice you make will depend on the area of the project and the purpose for which the flooring is needed.

Broadloom carpets: for customised designs and a luxurious feel

For cabins, corridors and public areas, broadloom carpets are a good pick because they provide a luxurious feeling, underfoot comfort, warmth and noise absorption. They come in different weights and classifications, so there will be a suitable option for different traffic intensities.

Broadloom carpets are ideal for marine areas as they can use highly customised or individual designs to match patterns and certain interiors. They are perfect for big designs using strong colours that often feature in public areas of a vessel such as casinos and bars. But they work just as well for cabins, where designs usually focus on subtle colours. They’re also a natural choice for wayfinding and zoning certain areas of a vessel and can be designed and installed to fit this.

Broadloom carpets can use highly customised or individual designs to suit different marine interiors

Broadloom carpets: What are the choices?

Ege Carpets’ broadloom carpets for the marine interior industry are IMO classified and come in different yarns. These can range from a high wool content, such as an 80/20 wool-to-nylon combination, through to 100 percent nylon broadloom carpets.

Carpet tiles for easy access to underfloor

Then there are IMO-approved carpet tiles. The advantage of this choice of flooring for marine projects is that they enable easy access to the underfloor. Their functionality is appropriate, therefore, for wheelhouses, back offices and crew areas, giving ready entry to cables and other underfloorings. Furthermore, installation is somewhat faster as you don’t need to remove all interiors before installing the carpet tiles. They are also easier to transport on board.

IMO approved carpet tiles allow for easy access to the underfloor

Carpet backings for easy installation

There are also different carpet backing options available for marine projects. There are woven textile backings, for example, that are used for installations requiring greater underfoot comfort. However, woven backings normally have a separate underlay requiring a double-stick installation.

Then there are the integrated felt backings which can be fitted as direct-stick installations. This saves time, weight and costs, which are often critical issues in marine interiors projects. This option offers a lot of flexibility so is ideal for a variety of projects, for example, if you’re re-fitting your carpets and grippers are already fixed in the existing installation.

Some carpet tile options are also available with sustainable backings made from recycled products. Waste such as plastic water bottles makes an excellent felt carpet backing with the added benefit of having sound-reducing abilities.

Options for marine project from Ege Carpets

Ege Carpets has a number of carpet concepts based on different production technologies that are well suited for the marine interiors sector, particularly where time and the environment are crucial factors:

  • The Colortec concept: This option uses pre-dyed yarn with 80 percent wool content. Within this concept, you can design on a “one yarn – one colour” basis. As a single colour is used for every single yarn, the concept offers a completely unrestricted colour range. It also enables total freedom to design individualised carpets for your marine project.
The Colortec concept enables total freedom to design individualised carpets for your marine project
  • The Graphic concept: This concept uses the same pre-dyed yarn as the Colortec but is an optimum solution for small pattern repeats or plain carpets. Both the Colortec and Graphic concepts come with laminated backings to reduce their weight and to optimise pattern match from roll to roll.
The Graphic concept is an optimum solution for small pattern repeats or plain carpets
  • The Highline concept: This dye-injected concept is a fast-track system, offering full design freedom These customisable carpets are produced in both 80/20 wool-nylon mix and 100 percent nylon, as both broadloom and carpet tiles. All options are IMO certified.
The Highline concept is a fast-track system, offering full design freedom

Refresh your knowledge, source suppliers for your next project, and connect with representatives from world-leading cruise lines at Cruise Ship Interiors Expo America. Find out all about the next event here.