Maxwell posted a photo of Morrocan cement tiles recently and we love their time-worn beauty as well. In an entryway or kitchen where there's no upholstered furniture to clash with, they draw your eye in and welcome you. And they are a perfect antidote to all things sleek and shiny...
We don't have hallways this large, but we do have a sorta-mudroom area at the back door which would be a great place to inlay some tiles into the wood floor in a little area "rug." There are a lot of of places that sell new and antique cement tiles, and there are so many colors! Some of the newer patterns are easier to get and would even look great as a backsplash or as an accent under a bathroom sink.
Our friend Nancy installed cement tiles around the tub in her bathroom and mixed it with a wood floor. We've always loved how it manages to be both warm and cool at the same time.
Here are some links to places that sell new and antique cement tiles:
Concrete Cottage has a list of places that sell antique cement tiles around the world
Provence Retrouvee sources tiles (and other things!) from the demolitions of ancient buildings in southern France.
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Comments (7)
They are the perfect antidote...an anecdote is a story.
That pale creamy yellow on the walls in the top photo is gorgeous. I'd say it's super close to Benjamin Moore's "ambiance".
dreamy gettaway house, but its yours- I like that!
Oh I looooove cement tiles! The best ones I have seen are in colonial buildings in Southeast Asia... so cool and perfect on bare feet, and beautiful with white walls, dark wood and a quiet ceiling fan...
Aw. The tile in the first photo is freakishly GORGEOUS!
The glass work and moldings in the third photo... FABULOUS!
They don't make 'em like that anymore.
you can find more links to them by searching under "encaustic tile" -- lots of great salvaged ones are around, especially in the UK, where they were popular in Victorian and Edwardian entryways.
This site is really cool, giving a better idea of the breadth of the product (and the tiles Maxwell showed are there too):
http://www.villalagoontile.com/history-of-encaustic-tiles.html
If you look closely at the border tile near the wood in the bathroom photo, you will see why it is very important to stay right with your tile layers as they install your patterned cement tile. I just had about 6 rooms covered in cement tile last week and even tho I was onsite the whole time, I almost missed several screw-ups and in one instance, a wrong solid color got installed outside a bordered tile rug. Half of it was done before I saw it. But as luck would have it, the color looks OK, so no big deal. I like it.
I also tried to pull each and every tile out of the boxes myself and look for any I wanted to 'cull' . Occasionaly a cement tile gets made w/ the colors in the wrong place, or one gets put in the wrong box. Or the color is smeared or just plain 'off'. You are lucky if your tile layer watches and catches those. Most don't or can't. (Remember that many men are color blind!)
But the point is, tile layers are basically interested in one thing, getting tile on that floor as fast as possible. So with complicated designs, stay with them and supervise.
You can see my new cement tile floors at http://www.ConcreteCottage.com/tile-floors.html