Mats
Mats are pieces of fiber, fabric or other material laid on the floor. The doormat is the one at the entry, set down so shoes can be wiped before dirt gets inside.
How to choose Mats
- Coir. Stiff coconut husk fiber resists abrasion, so it holds up to hard scraping from shoes at an outer door.
- Woven or felted fabric. Fabric mats are softer underfoot than coir, which suits the inside of the door.
- Fiber label. Textile rugs, carpets and mats must list their fibers by share of weight, and fibers below 5 percent of the weight can be listed simply as other fiber. Backings and pads under a rug are not covered.
About Mats
Mats are floor coverings with an old name: the word reached English through Late Latin matta before the 12th century. The word doormat followed by 1665, naming a mat set before or inside a door to wipe dirt from shoes.
The stiffest doormats are coir, the coarse, reddish brown fiber from the outer husk of the coconut. It is mostly cellulose and lignin, a woody plant substance, and its English name, recorded since 1582, comes from the Tamil word for rope. India and Sri Lanka are the main producers of the fiber, and the same fiber goes into brushes, rope and garden potting mixes.
At a glance
- Made from
- Coir or fabric, often on a backing
- Main types
- Doormats, welcome mats, floor mats
- Label terms
- Fiber content, country of origin
Mats questions
Should a doormat go inside or outside the door?
Both. Federal lead-safety guidance suggests doormats outside and inside every entryway, plus taking shoes off at the door. Outdoor soil can hold lead from old paint or past leaded gasoline, and soil tracked inside spreads through the house as dust. Two mats catch more of it before it reaches the floors.
Why is it called a welcome mat?
A doormat at the front step came to stand for hospitality, so by 1946 English speakers were using welcome mat as a figure of speech for any warm reception. The object itself kept its plain job of catching dirt at the door.
Sources: US Environmental Protection Agency; Federal Trade Commission; Merriam-Webster.
