Featured here is a photo of a grey mosaic custom shower stall we created. The master bathroom in this house had a very dark shower. Our friends said it felt like showering in a small grain silo. Our challenge was to redo the entire bathroom with the shower as the focal point. The first order of business was to build a small half wall (image right) where glass would be installed. The light coming into the new stall would hopefully make it feel much bigger. When the new glass doors were installed it certainly did.
We presented a series of tile options after being assigned the goal of using mosaic tiles. For this mosaic custom shower, our friends chose a series of light grey tiles. The tile chosen resembled a linen shirt in texture. As seen in this image, the grey tiles used for the shower tray are a slightly darker tone than the walls. This provided a nice contrast to the wall tiles. When it was completed, this master bathroom had changed quite dramatically. The old master bathroom was very dated with talavera tiles – this new design elegant and light by comparison. All of us involved with creating it were happy with the results.
A new trend has surfaced in the past few years – that of using large tiles in bathrooms. We really enjoy the look and can say that they often are much easier to install than smaller tiles. So, if ever trying to save on labor costs, we can suggest a larger tile. They not only go up quickly but cover more area and are a bit less fussy than smaller tiles.
We have on occasion had challenges with the mesh used for some very small mosaics. For one project we had to stop and re-mesh every single sheet of 12 x 12 mosaic tiles. As soon as we would use our wet tile saw to cut a sheet, they would disintegrate. It added a great deal of time and cost to the project. Our advice? When choosing a small mosaic, have your vendor review the durability of the mesh the manufacturer has used!