In my last post, I wrote about the tiles we chose for our house. One would think that tile selection is nearly complete once you have decided amongst yourselves which tiles you like and where you want to put them. Oh no, it is not that simple. Nor is it something you can do in a hurry.
Part two of tile selection begins when you call the assistant over. This is not as short a process as you might think. I recommend taking all of your plans with you when you go to make your tile selection. The consultants can be quite knowledgeable and can offer plenty of good advice, especially if you are planning to use feature tiles, so it pays to be able to show them the various views for each room.
When you sit down with the consultant, a form is filled in that lists each of the rooms to be tiled, which tiles you wish to use, the direction in which they are to be laid, their price and what grout will be used.
When I thought of grout, I thought it was black, brown, or white. How wrong I was. Grout comes in many different colours and shades; different grits depending on whether you have selected a rectified or cushioned edged tile; and, can have additives such as flex agents.
Your tile consultant will take care of the flex and grit choices, but you will need to do another round of colour choices. We decided to keep things simple by choosing grout colours that best matched the colour of the tiles. For our “snowy white” wall tiles, we chose an “ultra white” grout and a “charred ash” grout for our feature ensuite wall tiles.
Our beloved floor tiles were a pain to colour match, as they seem to be a brown-grey-blue colour. Eventually we chose “charred ash.” It was slightly lighter than the colour of the tile. We are not great fans of grout lines, so hopefully choosing a grout colour a shade or two lighter than the tile, will help the grout lines to blend and not be so obvious.
Our tile consultation took about an hour. Make sure you ask your consultant plenty of questions, especially if you are mixing tile sizes and edge types. One of the best tips we were given was “to ask our builder whether we can pay any costs over our allotted allowance directly to the tile store, so that we can avoid paying the builder’s mark-up.” Thankfully, Ventura already operates this way.
Thursday, July 14, 2011
Saturday, July 9, 2011
Milestone: Tile Selection (Part One)
Choosing the right tiles was a tough one. Most of the display homes we visited seemed to favour light coloured flooring in order to make the house look bigger. Light flooring is lovely, however, we also loved the dark floors favoured by images of “designer homes” that we saw online.
Light floor or dark floor? The answer changed daily.
In the end, we left the tile selection to chance. We were at the mercy of the tile store displays. All we knew is that we were looking for either a light grey/white tile or a dark grey/black tile. It appears that brown is in vogue, and this narrowed our selections greatly. Who would have thought it hard to find grey tiles? Thankfully, the fourth tile store we visited had something that we both liked.
The winning tile is “Antracite” part of the Marmo Royal series by Ceramica Monica.
Marmo Royal is one of the few series of tiles we found, which offers both 300 x 300 mm and 600 x 600 mm format tiles. This allows us to have matching tiles in both the main and wet areas. This really appeals to me.
I remember seeing a display home in Piara Waters, which had 600 x 600 mm tiles in the main areas and matching 300 x 300 mm tiles in the wet area. It looked stunning. The tiles flowed from room to room and brought each part of the house together. I loved it!
Once we had our floor tiles sorted, it was onto the wall tiles. Like many people, we chose a 300 x 600 mm white tile for our bathroom. You cannot escape the allure of clean, white, bathroom tiles. Unlike many display homes, we did not choose a feature mosaic tile.
Our bathroom is small and narrow. To put a feature tile on one of the walls would be overpowering. In an attempt to make the room look longer, we will be laying our white wall tiles horizontally and using the floor tiles to tile the bath hob.
The ensuite, however, is a completely different matter. It is huge! For this room, we have chosen a solid colour feature tile for the back wall. Like the wall tiles, it is a 300 x 600 mm format tile.
Unfortunately, this tile store did not have a large selection of solid colour feature tiles (but they did have an amazing selection of mosaics!). Given the available selection, we chose a matt blue-grey tile. I would have preferred to use a dark charcoal/grey tile as the feature, but unfortunately, they did not have one in the correct size/colour.
As for the rest of our tiles, the laundry splashback will uses the same white tiles as the bathroom wall and we have deleted the kitchen splashback tiling so that we can install a glass splashback after handover. I have my heart set on either a black or bauxite splashback.
Speaking of the kitchen, it is worth selecting your kitchen kickboard colour at the same time as you choose your main area floor tiles. It is amazing how colours can seemingly go together in your mind, but looks completely wrong when you bring them together.
Tip: Most manufacturers offer free samples via their website. Even though you will find the tile stores already have samples, I found it useful having my own, so I could test the different colour combinations at my leisure.
Light floor or dark floor? The answer changed daily.
In the end, we left the tile selection to chance. We were at the mercy of the tile store displays. All we knew is that we were looking for either a light grey/white tile or a dark grey/black tile. It appears that brown is in vogue, and this narrowed our selections greatly. Who would have thought it hard to find grey tiles? Thankfully, the fourth tile store we visited had something that we both liked.
 |
| Marmo Royal by Ceramica Monica |
Marmo Royal is one of the few series of tiles we found, which offers both 300 x 300 mm and 600 x 600 mm format tiles. This allows us to have matching tiles in both the main and wet areas. This really appeals to me.
I remember seeing a display home in Piara Waters, which had 600 x 600 mm tiles in the main areas and matching 300 x 300 mm tiles in the wet area. It looked stunning. The tiles flowed from room to room and brought each part of the house together. I loved it!
Once we had our floor tiles sorted, it was onto the wall tiles. Like many people, we chose a 300 x 600 mm white tile for our bathroom. You cannot escape the allure of clean, white, bathroom tiles. Unlike many display homes, we did not choose a feature mosaic tile.
Our bathroom is small and narrow. To put a feature tile on one of the walls would be overpowering. In an attempt to make the room look longer, we will be laying our white wall tiles horizontally and using the floor tiles to tile the bath hob.
 |
| Ensuite Colour Scheme: floor tile, feature wall tile |
Unfortunately, this tile store did not have a large selection of solid colour feature tiles (but they did have an amazing selection of mosaics!). Given the available selection, we chose a matt blue-grey tile. I would have preferred to use a dark charcoal/grey tile as the feature, but unfortunately, they did not have one in the correct size/colour.
As for the rest of our tiles, the laundry splashback will uses the same white tiles as the bathroom wall and we have deleted the kitchen splashback tiling so that we can install a glass splashback after handover. I have my heart set on either a black or bauxite splashback.
Speaking of the kitchen, it is worth selecting your kitchen kickboard colour at the same time as you choose your main area floor tiles. It is amazing how colours can seemingly go together in your mind, but looks completely wrong when you bring them together.
Tip: Most manufacturers offer free samples via their website. Even though you will find the tile stores already have samples, I found it useful having my own, so I could test the different colour combinations at my leisure.
Friday, July 1, 2011
Design Dilemma - Ensuite Shower Screen
When we designed our ensuite, we forgot to ask one important question. What is the maximum width for a shower screen? According to our builder, the widest shower screen they will install is 1500mm. We wanted one that was 1910mm wide.
What do you do when you are short 410mm of glass? Our builder suggested building a small wall/pillar. This pillar could go in one of three places: on the open end of the recess, in the middle, or on the right. My preference was to either hide it away in a corner or make a feature out of it.
I have been modelling our house using SweetHome3D. This is one of those times when having a 3D model really helps. Below are the three options for the placement of the pillar. Which do you prefer?
Ventura has given us the option to install our own shower screen after handover. I have spoken to a few companies who install shower screens and opinions appear to be split as to whether a shower screen this big could/should be installed.
Who would have thought that 40cm of glass would be so troublesome? I must say thank you to everyone on the Homeone forum who has already offered an opinion and tried to help.
Update (20/07/2011): We have decided to accept a credit for the framed shower screen provided by Ventura. We will be installing our own frameless/semi-frameless shower screen after handover. Fingers crossed everything goes according to plan!
 |
| Our original bathroom design |
What do you do when you are short 410mm of glass? Our builder suggested building a small wall/pillar. This pillar could go in one of three places: on the open end of the recess, in the middle, or on the right. My preference was to either hide it away in a corner or make a feature out of it.
I have been modelling our house using SweetHome3D. This is one of those times when having a 3D model really helps. Below are the three options for the placement of the pillar. Which do you prefer?
 |
| As suggested by our builder, having the pillar on the left will provide additional support for the screen. |
 |
| We could try to hide the pillar, by placing it on the right hand side. This does mean that the shower screen will need some form of roof/wall support on the open end. |
 |
| Placing the pillar in the middle of the shower screen, would provide a place to mount the bath filler. |
Ventura has given us the option to install our own shower screen after handover. I have spoken to a few companies who install shower screens and opinions appear to be split as to whether a shower screen this big could/should be installed.
Who would have thought that 40cm of glass would be so troublesome? I must say thank you to everyone on the Homeone forum who has already offered an opinion and tried to help.
Update (20/07/2011): We have decided to accept a credit for the framed shower screen provided by Ventura. We will be installing our own frameless/semi-frameless shower screen after handover. Fingers crossed everything goes according to plan!
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