Pile Height and Density

Frieze - Short, tight twist carpet. This is a long wearing carpet.

Textured Plush - A frieze with longer pile and less dense.  Excellent for wear, and elegant looking.

Textured Saxony - This is a textured plush but with less yarn.  Performs well, but will show noticeable crushing in high traffic areas.

Finishing

Velvet - Sheared, dense, and not crimped.  This style shows the most footprints, vacuum marks and is the most difficult to seam well.  Usually in a solid color, but may not hide dirt well.

Plush - Similar to velvet but less dense, more coarse look, and not as tightly twisted.  Shows footprints and may show seams.

Looped Carpet - Looped carpet often look good longer than a plush, often used in commercial applications.  Choose a dense loop for long life.

Berber - Carpet that is looped with flecks of color, may vary in size.  Not all Berber carpets wear well because of fiber content.

Color

Use common sense - a light color will show more dirt, and darker colors require more frequent vacuuming to keep particles from being noticed.

Be careful about using trendy colors - you may find you soon tire of the color.

Fiber Types

Nylon - Strong fiber, great for high traffic areas when used in a high density carpet.  When treated with stain resistance it will perform well for 5 years.

Polyester - Strong fiber compares with nylon in strength, made from recycled pop bottles.  Loosely woven carpets may mat and crush.

Olefin - Best suited for indoor/outdoor use.  Performs well if the pile height is low.  This fiber will crush.

Wool - Expensive carpet, long lasting luxury carpet.  Makes an excellent Berber, plush, and frieze.

Types of Padding

Waffle - Contains a large amount of air, allowing it to crush under pressure.  Not suitable for high traffic areas.

Slab Rubber - Resists crushing and suitable for high traffic areas.

Foam Padding - Made from urethane foam and available in many thicknesses and densities, not good for high traffic.

Rebond - Made from scraps of high density foam, available in many thicknessess, good for high traffic areas.

Frothed Foam - Made from super dense urethane.  Very durable.

Fiber - Used under area rugs and some Berber.

Berber Pad - Special pad for use under some types of Berber.