[Organizers] Re: Fwd: Community building floor

Coming in late ... was helping out at the Meet Me in St. Louis Memorial Day weekend dance ... I was a modern dancer once upon a time and encountered a lot of marley. All of the marley I ran into targeted ballet and toe shoes which requires a high level of horizontal friction. Not the end of the world for contra dance, but not ideal for buzz step et al as has been mentioned. I had the privilege of rehearsing a few times at an Atlanta Ballet rehearsal space. That floor was literally sprung ... with springs ... which made running on it almost like running on a diving board! So fully ballet level sprung floors are not optimum either. Atlanta contra dance has put down a plywood/strips semi-"sprung" floor that was a fine floor (many many years ago). Plywood had a poly finish for protection. Recently a friend laid a floor for dancing (she contra dances) in an out building that had a mix of concrete and joists. In that space ... strips of wood w/ pool noodle slices for extra cushion noodle slices stapled onto wood strip just laid on floor plywood screwed into wood strips (stabilizing everything) modern engineered snap in floor laid in on top of plywood et al I'm tossing out as FYI. Your community center multi-use space won't want to mess with plywood. Heitzso Hi, From my experience working for New York ballet and modern dance companies and from doing the folk dancing we talk about here, I'd offer that the key word is "sprung" and I'd suggest researching portable and temporary sprung dance floors. See: https://www.stagestep.com/subfloor-systems/springstep-v/ Unacceptable: wood or wood-like flooring installed directly on concrete, without springing. This is as hard, unforgiving, unpleasant and injurious as concrete. Sometimes a search for "dance floors" turns up "marley," which is floor covering, only. It is non-slip vinyl that makes an underlying sprung floor safe for stage dance. https://danceequipmentintl.com/marley-dance-floor-guide/ There are soft and hard versions of marley designed for styles of dance and footware. Again, marley alone doesn't make a concrete or a non-sprung floor ok, but it can be quickly rolled out onto an "okay" residential wood beam constructed floor for dancing. An advantage to this route is that, for low cost, it will protect the surface of, say, a basketball court enabling a multi-purpose floor. One might also research the floors for basketball courts which have the same requirements of being wood, but soft. As an aside, your challenge reminds me of the floors of large event arenas, which might have to be changed from a basketball court to an ice rink to a stadium floor, etc. Sometimes, also, a hard floor problem can be solved with footwear. Yours might become a sneaker dance on a concrete floor, just as sneakers are used for street dance (e.g., hip hop). Sounds like an exciting project. Best wishes, Rob - - - - - - - - - - - - Robert Matson President Innovation Media Corp. The Innovation Works, Inc. Tel: (646) 233-1219 Cell: (917) 626-2675 On Fri, May 26, 2023 at 9:28 AM Jim Thaxter via Organizers < organizers(a)lists.sharedweight.net&gt; wrote: _______________________________________________ Organizers mailing list -- organizers(a)lists.sharedweight.net To unsubscribe send an email to organizers-leave(a)lists.sharedweight.net _______________________________________________ Organizers mailing list -- organizers(a)lists.sharedweight.net To unsubscribe send an email to organizers-leave(a)lists.sharedweight.net