I live in northern California in a town very close to the Fireclay store. I absolutely love their tile, especially the Vitrail series. They have been doing business in San Jose, CA for a long time and still make the tiles the old fashioned way. I seriously considered their tiles for my backsplash, but in the end opted for the lower price point of the Grazia Rixi crackle subway tiles. I did use the the cranberry colored tile to outline my niche behind my oven, which I was able to get from their bone yard for $10.00. The tile for my backsplash would have averaged $24 per square foot.

Anyways, they make the most gorgeous colors, they are master craftsmen, so if you can afford it, by all means go for it. I went back many times to their bone yard, but, of course, I couldn't find the golden yellowish tile that I wanted/needed for my backsplash.

Here's a picture of my backsplash where you can see the outline for my niche.

This is a picture before the grout was done. I just got the tile grouted yesterday and haven't had time to take a picture yet. The color that I fell in love with was the pistachio color. The Rixi tile is also beautiful and it is called dore (gold in Italian).

You can't beat the amazing colors that they offer. I hope this helps!

Here's another perspective:

OMG thank you! It helps so much - gives me an idea of their cost level, and it's great to know they've been around for a while. I can't wait to hear back from them about how best to buy from them, etc.

Your kitchen is incredibly beautiful, btw!! Thanks for telling me about the Rixi tile, I'm definitely going to research them.

See, I knew the forumites would have all the answers! (May have to check out the "boneyard when I come your way soon.) ;)

You are welcome--glad I could help. As I understand it, they use the local clay and recycled materials to create their product. San Jose is known for its clay soil, which can make gardening a challenge here. The reason the price point is higher than other manufacturers is that they can't keep all of the many custom colors that they offer in stock, so they make the tiles on a per order basis. Because the tiles are hand made, they have a hand made look and feel with all the slight variations in size, color, and the patina of hand made tile.

The owner is well-known in our area and I know he has received awards for having a green product. I think they also make the old California style tiles that are used in our California Spanish style homes bungalows. The catalogs on their Web site give a good idea of their many offerings.

Thanks for the compliment on my kitchen! I hung out here on the garden web during the planning and implementation stages in the 2008-2008 time frame. It took me a whole year to find the tiles for my backsplash and the time and money to finish up the kitchen. I'm mid-steam in a bathroom remodel right now, so I hang out in the bathrooms forum now.

Yeah, the bone yard is awesome. Local artists go there all the time and I think they even give a class there on how to make stepping stones from the overstock and seconds there.

Good luck!

We also live in Northern California (go Giants) and visited Fireclay when we redid our bathrooms. The people there are very helpful and they make an amazing range of products. In the end, we used Heath Ceramics (Sausalito) because we wanted a matte finish. Fireclay specializes in glossy and crackle, if memory serves me right.

Both Heath and Fireclay sell overstocks. Fireclay calls it their boneyard, as Karena mentions. You can get some great deals there, especially if you only need a small amount. Great looking tile, Karena.

Thanks overlyoptimistic! One of these days, I need to get my kitchen listed in the Finished Kitchens!

Hi Riley605

Eric here. I'm a co-owner of Fireclay Tile. Thanks for your questions and for your interest in our products!

It's nice to see some locals adding to the conversation and everything they say is true. We use locally sourced recycled materials for our Debris Series Recycled Tile, and our Vitrail Series is also handmade by us in our northern california factory. We love colors and making orders unique for each customer, and do the same with Claymonde in that we handglaze each order unique for the customer.

You can find our full catalog on our website at www.fireclaytile.com/catalog and you can find a list of a our nationwide network of dealers at http://fireclay.force.com/dealers. Depending on where you live we definitely encourage you to visit a local dealer, but if there is not a dealer locally just let us know.

If you have an idea of what you are looking for, also feel free to send us an email at info@fireclaytile.com and we can give you a quote.

karena_2009, we'd love to see your finished product and post it to our facebook page!

Thanks everyone.

Eric

Here is a link that might be useful: Fireclay Tile Website

This is really helpful for me since I've been researching tile for my backsplash. I'm not buying get since my counters first have to be picked out and installed but I'd like to collect samples to take to NY with me when I go pick out my slabs. I'm still tossed between glass and some kind of clean larger format ceramic (crackled maybe) and came upon Fireclay Claymonde. Came on here to check out if any of you guys knew about quality/cost and voila... info!

I'm glad you wrote in Eric... I'll be contacting you.
Elyse