Ideas · planning · tile detail

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78 articles

How to measure, compare and plan a tiling job, with the numbers worked through and every product fact taken from its product page.

From the journal

Room ideas and practical decisions.

Editorial wall study: narrow white ceramic subway tiles laid in a running bond, their glossy uneven glaze catching daylight from the left, set with clearly visible mid-grey grout lines in a dense lattice.

Formats

Subway tiles: 11 faces compared by size, finish and joint count

Eleven subway tiles compared on what their product pages record: all ceramic at 8 mm, six flat and five wave, two sizes, and the joint length each one carries.

10 September 2026 Read article

Concrete look

Concrete-look tiles: 6 faces compared by size, finish and joint count

Six concrete-look tiles compared on the rows their product pages record: all porcelain, all matt, one size or two, and what each page leaves blank.

9 Sep 2026

Editorial wall study: large ivory travertine-look tiles with a fine horizontal vein-cut grain, under soft late-afternoon daylight that throws a diagonal window shadow across the left. Quiet joints.

Formats

Travertine-look tiles: 5 faces compared, vein-cut grain to joint count

Five travertine-look tiles compared: all porcelain, all matt. Two record a vein-cut grain; three do not mention one. Sizes and joint length per square metre.

9 Sep 2026

Editorial wall study: large rectangular stone-look tiles in charcoal and mid grey, laid in a running bond, their broken cleft surface picked out by raking daylight from the right. Narrow joints.

Formats

Stone-look tiles: 6 faces compared by finish, size and joint count

Six stone-look tiles compared: all record porcelain, across matt, honed and rough faces, with joint length per square metre for every size offered.

9 Sep 2026

Editorial scene: a compact ensuite seen from the doorway, deep green gloss tiles stacked vertically on one wall, plain white tiles on the others, a timber vanity and round mirror.

Bathroom

Small bathroom tile ideas: how to pick size, face and joints for the walls

A 1.9 × 1.7 m ensuite has about 16 m² of wall and a 2.4 m height some formats fill without a cut. Sizes, joint counts, gloss against...

6 Sep 2026

Editorial scene: two plain white tiles side by side on a white surface, one thinner with a glazed pillowed edge and one thicker with a sharp rectified edge.

Planning

Two white tiles that look the same: 7 rows that tell them apart

Twenty-nine white tiles here look alike in a photo. The rows that separate them: material, size, face, thickness, rectified edge, slip class and look.

6 Sep 2026

Editorial scene: a shrink-wrapped stack of new tiles, a tape measure, a blank folded sheet, a pencil and a notched trowel on a bench in a room being renovated.

Consumer law

Supplying your own tiles: what a tiling quote should list

When you buy the tiles and a tiler lays them, the quote decides who does what. Twelve items to see written down before you accept it; no dollar...

6 Sep 2026

Editorial scene: four tile sample pieces, gloss white, matt off-white, grey veined look and sage green, on a timber bench beside a window in afternoon light.

Colour

Tile samples at home: how to compare colour, light and pairing

What one sample piece can and cannot tell you, how to look at it under your own light, what the product page says about batches, and what to...

6 Sep 2026

Editorial scene: plain white matt wall tiles with three adjacent runs of dried grout in light grey, mid grey and charcoal, showing how grout colour changes the same tile.

Bathroom

Grout colours: why a dried sample joint beats the chart

Grout dries lighter than it looks wet, a chart is printed ink, and joint length per square metre decides how much of the wall is grout. How to...

6 Sep 2026

Editorial scene: four square terrazzo-look tiles with fine, large and oversized chips leaning against an olive wall on a dark timber bench.

Formats

Terrazzo-look tiles: 5 faces compared, chip scale to joint count

Five terrazzo-look tiles compared by chip scale, size, recorded finish and colour, with tiles and joint length per square metre and what a look does not record.

6 Sep 2026

Editorial scene: large-format white marble-look wall panels with soft grey veining laid horizontally behind a timber vanity, warm afternoon light.

Formats

Marble-look tiles: 14 faces compared by size, finish and colour

Fourteen marble-look tiles compared by size, recorded finish and colour, what a 'look' name records, and how they differ from the natural marble mosaics here.

6 Sep 2026