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How to run tile around shower? Please Help!

14 years ago

I'm hoping someone (maybe Bill Vincent?) can help. I want to do marble subway tile on the walls of my bath with about a 3-4" mini brick border on top -- with pencil molding below and a crown piece on top of the mini brick. The height of the tile around most of the room will be about 42" with the crown being the top piece until you hit the shower. The tile around the shower (in the corner) shoots up to about 76-80" and then back down again to 42" on the other side of the shower.

My question is what to do about the border. The best options I see are: (1) run the border/pencil/crown straight through the middle of the shower at 42" and use subways above the border to the ceiling or close to it; (2) just stop the border where the shower glass starts begins and then run the border along top of the shower; (3) run some border vertically where the tile goes up to 76" and then run along the top of the shower and back down again on the other side.

What is the best option? I'm afraid if I go with option 1 it make the ceiling height look low -- isn't it better to draw the eye up? Maybe I repeat the border near the ceiling and top with a crown instead of going all the way to the ceiling? With Option 2, I worry about how it will look to just stop the border. We're doing a frameless shower, so there is no frame to break up the tile. With Option 3, I wonder how it will look, and would I run the mini brick sideways or length-wise.

Does anyone have any advice or pictures? Thanks so much in advance!!!

Kirsten

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Comments (2)

kfroddy
Original Author
14 years ago
Here is link that will give you an idea of the border I wanted to do -- check out the honey onyx border third down the left column.

http://www.elontile.com/collections/design-concept-panels/
bill_vincent
14 years ago
Hi Kirsten-- I'd say go ahead and run the border through the shower, but if it were me, I'd stop the pencil rail that runs underneath the border right at the entrance to the shower, or you might end up with some issues with the glass. AS for the chair rail, I'd run that up and over the top of the tile, and back down on the other side, where you could restart the pencil rail, and the three elements come back together again.
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ptamom, florantha, fori, and trailrunner - thanks so muck for your feedback. Thanks holligator for the grout color feedback. I ended up trying to match the more beige tones in the tile to tone down the greens and yellows. I think it works. My one concern is that the sealer will make it darker. I don't think your grout looks lighter, just really great. muspic, I agree with you. I think once it is painted (later today) and the herbs are in place it will look fine. At least that is my hope. Thanks laurainlincoln. Staying strong here. It is a working kitchen, sayde. It's purpose is for serious cooking and not so serious enjoying of the cooking. It's about balance and I'm really trying to achieve that here. So here's the latest update....Finished tiling Sunday and grouting yesterday. Still have some touch ups and csulking to do today but he did it. When all was said and done he did say he was very pleased with the results. That's a very high accolade coming from him. Here's some pics! I love it! I love it so much I'm not even going to mind paint window trim today :) And I detest retailed trim painting because it's so time consuming. Thanks for all of your support. The end result was worth all of the angst. I'll post another pic when the herbs are in and it's what I hope it will be.
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