Advices for buying floor and wall tiles

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Advices for buying floor and wall tiles

Pleasantly coloured, with patterns or with shapes in relief, floor and wall tiles are always present in the bathroom, kitchen, balcony and in the entrance halls. In almost every house can be observed the main usage of floor and wall tiles in the bathroom and in the kitchen, but the most creative people or with different aesthetic and practical demands wish that these ones will decorate and define the appearance of other rooms.

Floor tiles, a part of the house’s personality

The sandstone is a rock composed of concrete sand which is easy to split into pieces and strips. The countries with tradition in manufacture of the sandstone and which use the sandstone in most of the house are the Mediterranean countries. The Nordic countries, however, use the sandstone only in the bathroom and in the kitchen.

The sandstone successfully defines a surface, but it has no thermal or sound insulating properties. There are two types of sandstones, depending on burning process: glazed or unglazed.

The glazed ones are obtained by double burning (bicottura) and one single burning (monocottura) and the unglazed ones (which include the porcelain sandstone and the red sandstone) are obtained by single burning (cotto). The sandstones are divided also by the degree of durability and quality, the so-called PEI tests (which determine the durability to abrasion).

There are three classes of PEI, from I to V, from the weakest (low traffic) to the highest level of durability for heavy traffic (in commercial areas, entrance halls and kitchens).

When you choose the floor tiles make the difference between the indoor ones and the outdoor ones. If you want to apply them on a porch or in other outdoor space, opt for treated sandstone that can withstand to frost and choose a texture that does not allow slipping; so avoid the porcelain sandstone and rather pick the one which mimics natural materials (stone, brick, gravel).

Wall tiles and their usage

In addition to sandstone, wall tiles can decorate any kind of wall and you can find it them variety of designs and colour combinations: from the classical white faience or in a single colour to the ones with patterns in relief, with insertions with leather or with other materials. The prices start in a proportional way to the complexity of the pattern, the company and the country of import. Wall tiles give a special feel to the bathroom, kitchen or to other rooms, it is practical (easy to clean) and it adapts to the personality of every house.

Before purchasing it, check how high is its power of water absorption – in the case in which the wall tiles are of a lower quality, the absorbed water will make it weaker to cracking and more brittle. But, usually, wall tiles are treated on the contact surface with the wall with a substance that prevents the absorption of moisture.

Nowadays, there are observed more trends in decorating with wall tiles: the wall tiles in two opposite colours or in the same shade, with the shade or the darker colour in the bottom side of the wall and the lighter one in the upper side to the ceiling, with vertical row with contrasting colours, with patterns in relief (flowers, geometric patterns) or with additions (pearls), realized by inserting of some materials (such as leather) which can give a touch of opulent luxury (or of kitsch depending of the rest of the decorating trend).

You cannot say that there are trending colours, but one of the most sought shades of colours is wenge (a dull texture, with vertical very fine striations which mimic the wood with the same name), in shades of dark brown or reddish brown. It is best combined with shades of cream with the same type of texture.

As well, in the bathroom is a trend to have red faience or a mixture of white and red, but also any other strong colours in a little bit shocking combinations. However, when you like a colour think about how it the space that you available will look: smaller or larger at optic level. A sandstone mixed with dark coloured faience will make a small bathroom look even smaller, while warm and bright colours with red and strong blue accents will increase the optical space.

Advices:

When purchasing floor and wall tiles do not forget to buy one or two additional boxes because some tiles must be cut in angles that will not fully-fit.

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