Creating a raised outdoor flooring system often presents significant design challenges. As professionals, we are constantly striving to achieve the right balance between aesthetics, functionality and long-term durability. This case study, featuring a modern villa with extensive outdoor living areas, demonstrates the effectiveness of Dakota's Level Up Anti-Fall Safety Grid for raised flooring systems.
The client wanted to create a seamless visual transition between the veranda and the pool surround, while also ensuring excellent drainage performance and easy access to the services beneath the floor for future inspection and maintenance.
This project involved a modern detached villa featuring contemporary architecture. The brief called for the installation of a large raised flooring system, extending seamlessly from the covered veranda to the paved area surrounding the in-ground swimming pool.
The design team’s objective was to create a visually and structurally seamless surface, eliminating changes in level and providing uninterrupted continuity throughout the outdoor living space.
Large-format 600 × 1200 mm porcelain tiles were selected for the project, thanks to their exceptional resistance to wear and weathering, as well as their outstanding aesthetic appeal.
However, large-format 600 × 1200 mm porcelain tiles require an exceptionally stable support system to ensure a perfectly level surface and prevent any movement once installed. For these reasons, Dakota's Level Up system was selected:
• Safety: Provide a solid, perfectly level support base for the 600 × 1200 mm porcelain tiles, reducing the risk of tile failure or collapse.
• Visual Continuity: Maintain the same floor finish from the veranda through to the pool surround.
• Efficient Drainage: Ensure rapid drainage of rainwater beneath the raised flooring system.
• Easy Access for Maintenance: Allow convenient access to services beneath the floor for future inspection and maintenance.
• Load-Bearing Performance: Reliably support the moderate loads expected in residential outdoor environments.
Installing a raised outdoor flooring system over an uneven sub-base, such as the one at this villa, presents a number of technical challenges.
To overcome the challenges of this project, the design team selected Dakota's Level Up system with our support. This robust, versatile and easy-to-install solution is ideal for raised flooring systems using large-format porcelain tiles, while also making it simple to accommodate changes in level and surface gradients without compromising performance.
In addition, the Level Up system provides an adjustable height range from 35mm to over 1,000mm, thanks to a comprehensive selection of extension pieces. This flexibility made it possible to accommodate the varying sub-base levels across the entire installation.
At the heart of the solution is the Level Up Safety Grid. To achieve the required structural performance, galvanised steel cross members were incorporated into the system. These play a vital role in distributing loads across multiple support points, significantly increasing the system's load-bearing capacity and helping to prevent localised failure, even if an individual porcelain tile becomes damaged or breaks.
The adjustable pedestal kit, with a height range of 48 to 74mm, provided the starting level for the raised flooring system. By adding 25mm and 50mm extension pieces, the installation team was able to achieve the precise finished heights required while accommodating the varying levels of the sub-base. To further enhance acoustic comfort and minimise vibration, noise-reducing rubber pads were also installed.
It is important to note that the ultimate failure load at the centre of the slab, when supported by five pedestals and reinforced with galvanised steel cross members, exceeds 9.0 kN. This demonstrates that the Dakota Level Up system, when correctly configured with its pedestal supports and steel reinforcement, provides outstanding structural safety for raised flooring installations while maintaining a maximum working load of 3.75 kN, in full compliance with EN 12825.
The adoption of the Dakota Level Up system successfully overcame all the challenges presented by the project. The result was an outdoor flooring installation that is not only visually impressive, but also robust and highly functional.
This approach enabled the creation of an outdoor living space that fully met the client's expectations while satisfying the demanding requirements of the design specification.
Equally important was the integration of the noise-reducing rubber pad, which helped to improve walking comfort by reducing impact noise and vibration. This detail is often overlooked, yet highly valued in residential environments. To discover more about the benefits of this type of raised flooring system, explore the Outdoor articles available in the Dakota Academy.
The poolside villa case study has demonstrated how the Dakota Level Up system represents a cutting-edge solution for creating raised outdoor flooring installations. This system has enabled faster installation and greater design flexibility, overcoming the typical challenges associated with uneven substrates and large surface areas.
Choosing high-performance, certified systems such as Level Up means ensuring long-lasting results. We invite you to consult our technical datasheets and contact our Dakota consultants for personalised support tailored to your project requirements.