As a dancer, sometimes a few hours a week in the dance studio just isn’t enough. But dancing on regular carpet, wood, or tile flooring can put unnecessary stress on your body and leave you vulnerable to injuries. Whether you’re coming up with original choreography or practicing the new steps you just learned in class, a maple portable dance floor is a dancer’s best friend.
But with so many options on the market, it can be hard to determine what kind of portable dance floor is right for you. That’s why today, we’re taking a look at maple portable dance floors, including how they’re different from other dance floors, how to pick the right one, and how to properly maintain them.
Why Are Maple Dance Floors Better?
When you’re surfing the internet for portable dance floors, all of the different woods can start to look the same. If this happens, you may be left scratching your head and wondering if there really is a difference between maple, birch, and ash dance floors. And if there is, does it even matter?
Increased Durability
Maple is a harder wood than either birch or ash. This hardness means it can stand up better to the intense and repetitive impacts that come with the majority of dance forms. Even interpretive modern dance comes with its fair share of leaping and jumping.
Better Sound Quality
For percussive dance forms, such as tap and Irish dance, you need a high-quality wood that will produce a rich sound with every ball change and toe-tap. When it comes to sound quality, maple wood is unmatched.
What Style of Dance Are Maple Portable Dance Floors Best for?
Maple portable dance floors are very versatile because they are typically sprung, making them suitable for most types of dance. However, maple is especially good for tap, Irish, jazz, and ballroom dancing. The increased strength and better sound quality of maple wood make it perfect for hard-hitting, percussive dance styles. And ballroom dancers love the beautiful looking surface that the maple wood provides.
Because of their bright, crisp sound, modern maple dance floors are not ideal for any tap studios that need to keep sound to a minimum. However, adding a layer of Marley vinyl flooring on top of the maple can help muffle unwanted noises.
How to Pick the Right Portable Dance Floor for Home Use
Once you’ve landed on maple for the material, all that’s left to consider is the size, brand, and price when choosing a portable dance floor.
Brand
Although the brand name isn’t always everything, when it comes to portable dance floors, it’s important to go with a brand that you trust.
A trustworthy brand is transparent about its materials, responsive, backed by years of industry experience, and has well-respected customer service.
Price
The price of a dance floor should never be the sole deciding factor, but we know it will always have an effect on your final decision. That’s why it’s important to have an idea of how much you’re willing to spend on your dance floors.
Before deciding on a strict budget for your dance floors, remember to do your research and consider that higher quality floors at a higher outset cost may get you more value in the long run. This dance floor research also gives you an opportunity to evaluate where it’s most important to allocate funds. A high quality sprung dance floor will protect your body for years to come, and increase the span of your dancing career.
Maple portable dance floors can cost anywhere from $500 to $3,000 or more, depending on how big they are, which brings us to our next question.
What Size Dance Floor Do I Need?
This question isn’t as straightforward as it may seem. The size of the dance floor that you need will depend on how many people will be using it and what styles of dance it’ll be used for.
For personal use, a 4′ x 4′ portable dance floor is a safe bet for most people. A 2′ x 2.5′ dance floor is as small as you should go, and even then, it’s not suitable for all dance types. Typically, small boards like this are good for tap dancing, whereas dance styles with grand sweeping motions and lots of moving about will require bigger dance floors.
However, if you’re investing in a maple portable dance floor for business use, such as renting out for events and parties, you’ll want to make sure you get one large enough for several people to dance on.
However, there’s no way of knowing how big your next event will be. This is why we recommend starting small and then scaling up with dance floors that can be expanded to create a larger dance floor when you need more space.
How to Maintain Your Maple Portable Dance Floor
Maple portable dance floors are fairly easy to maintain, but some extra caution should still be taken. Spills on the floor should be cleaned up immediately to prevent the dance floor from absorbing any liquid. When it gets dirty, it can easily be wiped clean with a warm washcloth and a gentle cleanser.
Additionally, if you use your maple portable dance floor for tap dancing, you can keep it clean by wiping it down after every session using a melamine sponge, otherwise known as a Magic Eraser.
Wring the melamine sponge out so that it’s just barely moist when you go to clean your maple dance floor. This approach will make it easier to ensure no water or cleaner sneak between the seams and make the floor easier to dry.
Permanent vs. Portable Maple Dance Floors
Whether you’re an intermediate dancer or a dance arts professional, it makes more sense to get a portable dance floor than a permanent one.
With a dance floor that you can pack up and take with you anywhere, you can teach class or practice from wherever you like. Not to mention, the cost to install permanent dance flooring in an entire room of your house can be astronomical and get you very little in return when you go to sell your house.
Where to Find High-Quality Portable Dance Floors
For exceptional portable dance floors that support every type of dancer, turn to O’Mara Sprung Floors. After more than 25 years in business, there’s nothing we love more than helping dancers find the dance floor that’s right for them. Shop our portable dance floors for sale today!
