Stylish 3D Ceramic Tile Upgrade
It’s common for ceramic or porcelain tile to have a bit of a three-dimensional surface texture. That’s actually typical. In fact it’s the norm for ceramic or porcelain tile to have a bit of a roundover or ease at the outer edges of the upper surface of the tile. That’s actually more common than not. Otherwise there’s a higher tendency for a little bit of lippage in the typical grout line at the edge of the tile. Today though we’re going to look at a type of tile that although it sounds similar, is actually different. Some tiles are actually specifically manufactured that have a significant variation in the depth. This is often called dimensional tiling or 3d tile.
Often small areas in kitchens or bathrooms are tiled with this type of product to add a visual focal area such as an accent wall. That’s also the case here. Overall this is a relatively wide or large surface of three dimensional tile, but it’s limited to one specific accent wall in a large kitchen area. This type of tile happens to be at least a bit more expensive than many other types of more traditional tile products, but there’s generally a wide range of prices in tile, more so than you might find in another section of the industry. For example, framing lumber has an overall much lower disparity or range of variation in prices.
Although prices vary depending on the specific location, source, species, lot size and vendor, generally, lumber is considered a commodity and the overall price range is relatively limited. Here in DC, for example, with all the different lumber vendors, the overall range between The least expensive and most expensive may only be 40%. You can expect to find the highest prices at the vendors who carry the smallest inventories. They get the worst prices from their suppliers because they’re buying in smaller lots which means less economy of scale.
As well, they have much higher costs for merchandising and sales. Meanwhile the nationwide or International big box stores roll out hacks, large pallets of their lumber on forklifts and basically forget about it until the customers carry the product up to the registers for them. They have much lower costs. The point is, even with this massive disparity of scale and supplier cists, the entire variance of cost across the market may only be roughly 40%, even at the extremes. That’s a low amount of variance across one geographic locality.
Ceramic tiles and products like this are much different though, the overall variance in the prices can literally be over 1,000%.
Here, in the picture below, you can see a section of that wall more closely but at a different angle. You can see the amount by which the tiles are actually protruding. The tiles that protrude the most are sticking out more than half of an inch and there are a variety of different depths or distances by which the other tiles protrude in the varying range in between. Some of them just protrude 1/8 of an inch, and others, one quarter inch or more.
If look at the wall or the surface of the tile directly or head on from a 90 degree angle, it almost looks like a typical tile installation. Of course, these happen to be long slender tiles, and they’re installed in a vertical position instead of horizontal position but that’s really fine, there’s nothing that says that it has to be installed more horizontal than vertical.
We normally find brick installed in that configuration or direction, for structural reasons, but tile doesn’t need to be installed that way. In almost all applications, tile has no structural capacity. In fact it’s normally a structural load, meaning that it is imposing itself upon the structure and not part of the load path of the structure which supports other things.
The vast majority of different types of tiles can be installed in any direction or angle that you choose. Here the designer chose for the long uninterrupted lines of the tile to be installed in a vertical position. Often, when we’re installing a bathroom floor we will recommend that the longest dimension of the tile have the uninterrupted lines run perpendicular to that longest floor dimension line.
That way when you’re looking across the room, it looks more like you’re looking at the typical course configuration of a brick wall which feels more intuitively natural. However, there’s no rule that says you have to do it one way or the other, from any standard or a requirement type perspective. In fact either direction is acceptable and fine. You can even install tile on a diagonal layout. Sometimes that even looks better.
Interestingly, when you change the angle of view just slightly the texture or contour of the wall surface becomes much more interesting because your eye instantly picks up on the three dimensional nature of the tile. That visual difference makes the wall look very interesting, it basically pops and stands out.
In this next week’s upcoming blog, we’ll take a closer look at some of the different angles of this particular tile and discuss some of the options. We will look at these details both in the case of this particular product and also in the case of more traditional or typical tiles for terminations at corners and some of the related design and aesthetic decision criteria.
Dupont Kitchen & Bath Can Help
As dedicated and local DC metropolitan kitchen and bath builders and installers, we pride ourselves on turning your visions into reality. Your kitchen and bathrooms can reflect your unique style and be designed with personalized aesthetics. It can be a process from creative designs to the realization of your dream space. Specializing in kitchen and bath construction, we bring expertise and skills to every project. If you’re contemplating a renovation, upgrade, or modernization in the local market, we’re happy to be your team. Consult with us, and we can start together on a path to redefine and elevate your DC living experience.
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