Tuesday 31 August 2010

Kitchen: tiling tales

Hurrah! The tiling is very nearly done apart from a bit of scrubbing needed to finish off. *big sigh of relief* I did the tiling all by myself. Yes, indeedy! I taught myself when we renovated the bathroom in our last flat.

The walls here made it difficult at times because they're not very even. Each tile needs a different amount of adhesive to bring the front of the tiles to a constant height. It took a lot of thought to get a good, even finish, with no gaps or oddly placed half tiles as the ends of rows, but I'm really, really pleased with the results, even though I say so myself!


I used cream grout between the tiles, rather than white, because, according to the tile shop, white tends to show the dirt and grease quickly in a kitchen, and discolours to dingy grey. Not nice.

I used wide spacers, rather than teeny narrow ones because the edges of the tiles are uneven. It gives them space to shine. ;-)



My top tiling tip is DON'T use adhesive and grout all in one, no matter what the adverts say. It's a TOTAL nightmare to clean off the tiles when you've finished. I was sucked in last time and so was dreading the cleaning part here but this lovely grout can almost be brushed off, which was a VERY pleasant surprise!



Our back doorstep used to be two badly fitted rectangles of mdf leaning against a makeshift cement step. SO not pretty. I asked our brilliant carpenter to make a proper wooden step for the back door and he came up with the fab idea of tiling it instead. Much more hardwearing, he said. Consequently, I have also been busy tiling that too....



So....it's now (or it will be when it's dried!) all covered up with smart charcoal grey slate tiles. Yummy. It was, indeed, an excellent idea so thank you, Mr Carpenter!




Now, on with fun part.....painting!

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6 comments :

Claire Potter said...

Very clever. I've never done tiling xxx

Anonymous said...

Hi, thank you for the compliment! i would like to be a follower of your log but there seems to be a technical problem at the moment. I'll be back later!
I enjoyed your post on the kitchen renovation as we just finished one in our home. greetz Marjo

The Cloth Shed said...

Very good result...you have done a great job tiling. Big spacers really are the answer for that professional look....separate adhesive and grout...definitely!
Been there too....
Julie x

Tricia said...

Heavens! Your done already? You sure did a good job! Just wanted to tell you that I'm going to follow you :)

Elaine said...

Kudos to you! I would never tackle a job like that. Looks like you did a fab job. What's next?

Deborah@Green Willow Pond said...

You did an outstanding job on your tile. I am going to be teaching myself how to tile when we enlarge and completely redo our main bathroom. It will be a while yet though ;)

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