I guess I should be kissing my tile installer. 80sf floor, white on white octagon and dot with a black and white border and installation of 2 10'x30" suntouch heat mats with self leveling compound on top. 3' x 5'6" shower with kerdi, all walls and ceiling tiled (herringbone tile on the ceiling, running bond ) but no floor - corian shower pan. Some liners and decos etc, mostly plain subway though. About 132sf all told, 21 of that herringbone. Bench top will be a piece of corian. 4'4" high wainscot with a 6x6 base, 1/2" x 6" liner, 13 courses of 3x6 subway tile, another 1/2" liner, 3x8 deco, 2x6 chair rail for a total of about 155 sq ft $2800 for labor including thinset and grout and self leveling compound. $850 for the floor and $1950 for everything else. That's about $10/sf overall for the floor and $6.60/sf for everything else (counting liners and chair rail in the per square foot price.) The shower walls have been durocked for him - does not include the actual kerdi membrane, tile or suntouch mats. He's incredibly meticulous, conscientious and the work I've seen of his is gorgeous. Sounds like I'm getting a killer bargain. I'm in NY about 75 miles north of the city. He's been doing this for 20 years.

custom_interior_deco, I purchased the tile from Christine at Artistic Abode. It looks like her current price per square foot is $14, so close to your target. It was the best deal I could find and allowed me to get exactly what I wanted. She supplied 3x6, 2x4, 1x6 field tile and then did a custom design for me on the 6x6 and 3x3 art tiles. I sent a line drawing which she used to create the art tiles. She sent lots of samples so I could look at colors and was patient with me while I worked out the design and placed the order. Maybe she will have something close to what you are looking for. Good luck! Jaymie

Bean - I think I looked at a zillion Sonoma samples! I decided against bc the small tiles were too much $, but the standard size were in budget. Perhaps I should revisit. My tile shop gives the Sonoma samples out in a 2x4 tile and it was sooo small to get a good idea, but I love the look in your photo. If you have one that's slightly closer up feel free to post if it isn't too much trouble. Some of the crackles I decided against bc the crackle seemed "too much". But the Sonoma seems very nice in your photo. I second jpmom - it looks great with your cabinets!

I recently finished a remodel which included master and guest bath with lots of tile work. In my experience, the person who actually installed the tiles did NOT frame the shower or do the waterproofing. That part was done by a other tradespeople who were hired by the GC and he was responsible for the quality of all of the work. Since GC worked with the same people for numerous jobs they were all familiar with each other so the person who actually installed the tile would be comfortable with whatever prep work was done for him. I imagine this is how good GC's operate with their trusted skilled tradespeople. As others have posted, skilled tile workers are in huge demand and so some of the finish work had to be fit in with other jobs the tile worker was doing - e.g. my hood in the kitchen was delayed and so the backsplash behind the cooktop and hood couldn't be done with the rest of the tile work as had been originally scheduled. The line items on my agreement with the GC included everything EXCEPT the actual tiles. Those were supplied and paid for by me - but I selected and ordered them through my designer so there weren't going to be issues regarding the quality of the tiles. Also, beyond the actual price of the tiles, the size and style of what you select is going to impact the actual price of the installation as some styles require more skill and labor costs will be higher. And as others have written, tile prices range in price from inexpensive to the stratosphere. Mine were $45 per square foot for 3" x 6" subway tiles and I had accent marble mosaic which was $145 per square foot :-). When my job was sent out to be bid, it included plans and diagrams for everything including the design plan and specifications for all the tile work so that would have been used by GC (in consultation) with his skilled people to determine what the bid was. A tiled shower is probably one of the aspects of home remodeling which gets screwed up the most which is why you are getting a lot of warnings from people. You should definitely get recommendations regarding your GC. I visited two places he was working on to get a sense of the quality of his work. And my contract included provisions that theoretically protected me as much as possible - and when I say theoretically, it's because any homeowner is screwed if it comes down to suing on a contract because the job has gone that bad. In terms of shower building, I am FAR from an expert but I spent some time and got excellent advice from people on this forum regarding waterproofing showers and so I was able to ask fairly intelligent questions. I also took pictures of the shower being built at various stages. And luckily I live in a place that has very serious inspectors and so the shower was inspected three times - including the 24 hour flood test so I was reasonably certain that between relying on the quality of the GC and his trusted workers and the inspectors, I had a first class shower.