Minimal Progress is Still Progress, Right?
Where I left off with the bathroom updates feels like eons ago. In the last post we discussed all the goodies I ordered for the bathrooms from Ferguson (you can read that post here). However, since then we’ve seen some progress, very minimal progress. Be it minimal, it’s still something, right?
So what has been taking so long you may ask? For the most part we have been held up with our tile installer only being able to work limited days, the holidays, as well as that I made a bit of an “oopsie” that caused for a slight delay, which I’ll explain.
Between the time our installer came last, which was to build out the hardy board walls, we had our stone installer set a beautiful piece of calacatta viola marble remnant. I had used the same stone in a clients’ home (below) and it was just so beautiful I was excited to have the chance to use it again, in our home no less! The colors in this marble paired so well with the rosewood marble, I had full confidence that I would love it.
Image of the the backsplash in our clients’ home. You can see the varying tones in the ground of the backsplash. Photo by: Chris Raz
Rosso Levanto Marble Curb
Fast forward to the night before our tile installer was to due arrive after being unavailable (due to “a cold”) for several weeks, I began to set out the floor tiles. Very quickly I started noticing that the ground color in the back of the floor tiles was not matching up with the ground color of the curb we had installed. The ground color of the curb in this particular piece was very green and warm, rather than other parts of the stone that have a very gray ground (you can see how the ground color ranges in the photo of our clients’ kitchen from warm to cool). The majority of the ground color in floor tiles on the other hand is a cool, light gray… The two types of stone together end up making the curb look dingy. In our defense, I did not select the exact part of the slab I wanted installed and my installer didn’t have the floor tiles in front of them to choose the specific part to cut from either. I realize I made a mistake in not confirming the area of the remnant that would be cut to make the curb, and sadly we had to have it removed. As a result this set us back an additional week, since our tile installer couldn’t come back before the new curb was installed and set.
What I will say is, I am happy I laid out the tiles before the installer arrived. This is something we always do for client work and recommend everyone working with natural stone does too. If I had not set out the tiles beforehand, I likely would have come home after a day at the office to discover the issue of the tiles not pairing well with the curb… after they were installed. That would have been VERY expensive to fix!
Another plus to laying out the tiles ahead of the install, was that I was able to weed out sheets of mosaics that were either too dark or too light. You have to remember that marble is a natural substance and it innately has a lot of variation, so it will not all be perfect and look exactly the same (duh, yep I should thought about this with the curb stone too, I know). In this rosewood tile alone, I discovered that there were bits of stone that were very brown, and some tiles even had greenish teal streaks that did not fit the overall color palette. If it was a sheet that maybe had only one strange tile and lots of others that looked fine, I could mark them and my installer could remove the individual tiles from the mosaic and replace them with a better pieces, before installing them. Doing this extra step will save everyone a lot of headaches, possible heartaches, stress and of course money!
As you can see from this image, I could immediately tell it wasn’t going to work
You can see how dingy the floor tiles make the curb stone look here
Once the new curb was installed, our tile installer could return to work. They first installed the floor, then came back another day (week) to install the wall tiles. Again, before they installed the wall tiles, I preset the layout on the floor in our guest bedroom to figure out how the tiles would layout on the wall in relation to the two niches.
You can see the new carrara marble curb installed with the floor tiles, and how much better they look together.
The tiles set out on the floor of our guest bedroom. With the placement of the two niches. The smaller one is for my toes to rest while shaving. The larger is for bottles.
To start, they set the border tiles and then set the field tiles.
You can see how the new curb looks much better with the border tiles and the field tiles.
The first wall of tile installed. The blue color is the waterproofing substance.
The rosewood pencil tile that will break up the 4 x 4 and 3 x 6 tiles.
As you can see in the above photo they installed the one wall. But only up to the pencil trim (second photo). Above the trim tile I plan to have 3 x 6 subway tiles in the same color and finish. also installed in a brick pattern.
The last date they were out was a month ago, on January 1st. Now, they are due to arrive this Friday to continue working. It’s been a long wait but I am really hoping we can get the tile completed as soon as possible. Next step will be to have the stone niche installed. The glass comes next.
Waiting on the tile has also held up ordering the hardware for the glass shower surround, because we can’t take accurate measurements until the tiles are completely installed. The hardware and glass cannot be modified once built, so it is imperative that we have the correct dimensions. Also, after some calls with local installers, due to the way that we have designed this shower (and the constraints of the room) the hardware for the glass is going to have to come from the UK. Which means it will cost us a lot more, and will take more time to produce. The reason being is a bit complicated to explain, so hopefully I can make it all make sense. Basically, we don’t want the glass door to be mounted on the wall. There is a chance that the other door to the room will interfere with the glass door. It also won’t look great. So we need to have the glass shower door set off the wall about 4” - 8”. This in turn means that the standard hardware will not be sturdy enough to support the swing of the door and requires additional structural support. The additional structural support is metal framing. Our local installers will only build the metal framing in chrome and we want it to be built in brass. Which is where the UK based company Rutland London, that specializes in radiators but also builds shower surrounds and hardware for bathrooms in brass comes into play. I have not used them yet, however I am hopeful we can make it work! More on that when we get to it though!
Until the next development happens, thanks for tuning in!
Products Specifications:
Floor tiles are 2 x 2 hex tiles in Rosewood marble by Castelli Marble