Why Kentwood
Why Kentwood
Bringing the beauty of nature into every living space
Kentwood was born in the Pacific Northwest, a landscape rich in rugged natural terrain, where land and sea meet the skies in an enduring cycle of seasonal diversity, and where winter storms and summer sun nurture breath-taking beauty and boundless vitality.
No wonder, then, that respect for the environment is embedded in our culture, and guides our approach to designing and manufacturing our products.
Our floors celebrate the unique character and natural beauty of genuine hardwood, while making responsible use of a sustainable resource to produce products of superior performance: hardwood floors to last a lifetime.
We value the health and well-being of the planet and its people, and craft our products to contribute to ensure cleaner living spaces, both inside and out.
Over 25 years, we have earned a reputation for integrity and innovative design, and we take inspiration in that uncompromising commitment to ourselves, our customers, and our communities; it informs our work, every day.
You may only buy a Kentwood floor once in your life, but you’ll treasure it every day, wherever you call home.
Crafted with conscience: Our commitment to Clean Floors
Kentwood floors are manufactured by Metropolitan, a company with a 30 year history of distributing and manufacturing premium quality wood flooring. During that time, Metropolitan has developed a quality assurance and environmental compliance program that is a model for our industry, a program we call ‘Clean Floors’.
Clean Floors is an extensive forest-to-floor program that monitors and verifies our material inputs and manufacturing processes to ensure our standards are being met in all areas, including ethical sourcing mandates, quality performance specifications, indoor air quality requirements, authentic environmental declarations and more. For example:
Our dedicated Environmental Compliance team oversees all aspects of our supply chain to ensure the integrity of our operations. Our reputation is such that the World Wildlife Federation (WWF) partnered with Metropolitan in a field study on sustainable forestry and our compliance team is regularly consulted by industry bodies and government agencies in Canada, the US, and abroad.
Our comprehensive Quality Control program monitors every stage of production; our hardwood floors typically undergo more than thirty documented QC checks. We routinely have our finishes, adhesives and other inputs tested by third parties to verify they are performing as required.
in addition to meeting regulated formaldehyde emission programs (CARB, TSCA Title VI, CANFER) our products are also voluntarily tested and certified on an ongoing basis to meet CA Section 01350 and UL’s GREENGUARD Gold, two of the strictest emissions standards in the world. (More about these programs below.)
Our commitment to Clean Floors ensures that Kentwood floors are carefully designed, responsibly crafted and will perform as intended.
To learn more about Clean Floors, please visit metrofloors.com (https://metrofloors.com/clean-floors) or email info@metrofloors.com.
Our commitment to indoor air quality
In recent years, indoor air quality has become an increasingly important factor in many home furnishings purchases. It has also long been a factor in how we design and produce Kentwood floors. For many years, we ensured CA 01350 compliance (a public testing protocol that establishes low limits on a wide range of VOCs) as a minimum production requirement; a few years ago, we chose the even more stringent GREENGUARD Gold to become our house standard.
GREENGUARD is a low emissions certification program owned and managed by Underwriters Laboratories (UL), one of the largest and most respected product safety organizations in the world. In UL’s words, GREENGUARD Gold certification is “designed to define low-emitting materials suitable for environments where people, particularly children and sensitive adults, spend extended periods of time, in particular schools and healthcare facilities.”
Naturally, GREENGUARD Gold certification is recognized by LEED and other green building products as a qualifying attribute.
Product listings on this website will continue to indicate products as either CA 01350 compliant, or as both CA 01350 compliant and GREENGUARD Gold certified as appropriate. To check the certification status of any specific product, check the features on the product page. For more information on our indoor air quality program and other environmental attributes, visit metrofloors.com.