I've installed several of the Kohler CI shower receptors. For clarity...the bottom edge of the tile isn't supposed to be 5/8" above the top of the receptor. The tile backer board is held a minimum of 5/8" above the top of the receptor. The tile itself can go lower. Whenever the tiles get kicked out like that, it's a sign that your wall studs needed to be furred out before the backer board got installed over the studs. Or as Bill wrote, another layer of cement board could have been put over the first. Your wall simply needed to be "thicker." I furr the studs by ripping strips off the edge of a 2x4 to whatever thickness is needed. Usually 3/16" give or take. It depends on the tolerances used in the initial wall framing. Those strips go right on the exposed edges of the studs to furr the wall out a bit. Then the backer board gets installed. Then the tile get set with no interference from the radius of the receptor's flange. Look at the diagrams at the top of page 8 in this pdf, you can see the furring strips, or "shims" between the wall studs and the tile backer board: http://www.us.kohler.com/webassets/kpna/catalog/pdf/en/1009404_2.pdf

Thanks for all the replies! This is our first house, not our "forever" house. We are planning to finish the bath update so we can put our house on the market within the next 8-10 months. Then hopefully we'll be in our "forever" (or at least for a long time) house. :) The tub in the master is somekind of old, original cast iron tub. So I know it will be a pain in the butt for our GC to remove! I'm not much of a bath person except for occasionally, but my hubby likes to take them a little more than occasionally. Really this update is to make our home more attractive to potential buyers and hopefully secure us a fast sale. The master is one of the only things we haven't updated in our home, and we're not planning on spending a fortune. What I DON'T want to do is spend this amt of money period, and then wish I had done the tub. It's in really good condition, but it's so narrow and shallow. I wanted to potentially put in a deeper, wider one, but the walls are an issue. The non-plumbing side is my husband's closet, which is the same size as mine (not very big, but a "walk in," which is the plumbing side.) Moving a wall is an expense I'm not willing to undertake, so that's why I was wondering if we could hack into the wall just a bit where the tub is against my husband's closet. I havent talked about this with my GC yet. I'll do that this week. But y'all have seen that done?? Removing the tub and taking the time/money/effort to create a big walk-in shower is not what I wanted to do. We do have another tub in the hall bath, but not having a tub in the master might make someone not want our house. It's all about resale at this point! At the lowest remodel cost. :)

I think it partially depends on whether you want the backsplash to look "framed". That's essentially what the porcelain tile will do because it is visually different from the glass tile. Bullnose tends to be more expensive than field tiles, and you will (almost definitely) have some scraps left over from doing the shower. I would consider cutting some of those scraps into the strip shape (as you would the bullnose) and taping it up as a layout to see if you like that framed look. If you do, then go ahead and cut the bullnose and tape that up. This would hopefully save you some money if it turns out you do not like the look of the frame around the glass tile. My personal preference would be to not do the bullnose around the glass tile. To me the mosaic is very pretty and has a lovely rounded edge and I would not want anything to take away the focus from the glass tiles. However, this is just my opinion, so feel free to ignore it.

Very timely thread for me. I'm trying to decide on which size subway tile as well. To mix things up I'm considering a narrower and longer size (2 3/8 x 7/12) or a wider and longer size (4x8 or 4x12). Is there any design guidance on how to decide between one size or the other? For example (I don't know, I'm making this up) the smaller, longer tiles look great in modern kitchens or the wider, longer tiles look best in kitchens with no uppers. Can those who picked subway tile backsplashes explain why they picked the size they did?