Tile: March
2003 and on……
First tiling job was the bathroom floor…..
Here you can see the diagonal layout of the field tile
on cement backer board.
This is the completed layout. A band of cream colored tile, all the same width,
borders the diagonal field. Outside this
is a band of light blue colored tile of whatever width was needed to fill to
the wall. Even though this is of
slightly varying width, the even band of cream tile fools the eye into seeing
the border as even all around.
Same pre-grout but emphasizing the border.
The finished floor with lavatory and toilet installed.
Next tile project was the kitchen counter. Maura wanted a floating counter with no
cabinets beneath. Mike Parker built and
installed the supporting structure. This
is the cooktop end….
The sink is in the higher part of the counter. Plan is to mask the pipe and sink front with
oak.
Cooktop cutout.
Dimensional lumber supports mdf which is
covered with cement backer board.
Here’s the support below the counter.
Maura’s gone to get the tile!
Tile cut and laid out to be sure it all fits! The space at the front will be covered with a
special edge tile. One edge tile is set
in front of the cooktop opening to check position.
See the gap?
After we laid the tile for the dry test, Maura said it had to go all the
way to the edge on the right end with no space left for edge tile because the
cabinet was going to butt up against it…..
well that’s what a dry run’s for!
The large field tile is positioned and will be laid
against the battens screwed to the front edge of the counter. After the field tile is set, we’ll take off
the battens and lay the edge tile. The cooktop drops into the opening and covers the cut edges of
the tile.
The sink is a little trickier. The sink is mounted under the cement backer
board. The grey
tile to the right is mounted to slope toward the sink to form a built in drain
board so it is lower than the rest of the tile.
How to finish this off????
By having the tile project out and finishing with a
narrow strip of tile?
Or stopping the field tile short and finishing with a
curved edge tile? That’s what we’ll
do! 
The edge tile is cut and held in place with tape to
check the fit.
Here we’ve set the edge tile with thinset
mortar and held it in place with tape.
When the mortar sets up a bit we can take off the tape
and start cleaning up the stray mortar.
