18x18 will not work very well design wise with a floor drain. You need a much smaller tile to be able to conform to the slope of the room. You don't want to be larger than about an 8x8 with a floor drain, and even then, the cuts around the drain will not be that pretty. If you have your contractor use epoxy grout like they do in commercial installations, then you will have no issues with permanent staining. The only other thing to be sure of is that your subfloor is firm enough deflectionwise to be able to support a tile floor. If you are on a concrete foundation, it's fine. However, if you are on a crawlspace or second floor, you need to look at the size of your joists, their spacing, and their span. That will determine how much "bounce" there is in your floor. Even if your floors feel firm, they still will have subtle deflection. Deflection creates cracked floors if not addressed before install.

From an old GW thread with GWA (our favorite girl with aspirin and great taste) o rectified tile and grout joints... am I asking too much? Brought to you by Advertisement clip this post email this post what is this? see most clipped and recent clippings PrintPage Posted by girlwithaspirin (My Page) on Wed, Aug 9, 06 at 14:53 I'm going with semi-polished, rectified 18"x18" porcelain. The tile sales rep warned me that few contractors will be willing to do a 1/16" grout joint, but she told me to stand my ground. Sure enough, I'm gathering bids, and the first two contractors won't do a 1/16" joint. I told them the tile is rectified. One guy actually asked, "What do you mean by that?" Disturbing, no? I explained it. Five minutes later, he tried to explain to me that porcelain tiles are rarely exactly the same size or completely square. Once again, I explained what "rectified" means, wishing I could just snap my fingers and make him disappear. Both of them have given me all the reasons why a 1/16" grout joint is impossible. My house is old, the floor can't possibly be completely level, a new subfloor won't fix anything, etc. The thing is, the current ceramic is at least 15 years old, and there's not a single crack, not even in the grout lines. Am I asking the impossible? (Bill V., if you're reading this, your reco is on vacation -- I'm hoping he's my salvation!) Aesthetically, I love the look of a tiny grout line, especially with this sort of tile. Follow-Up Postings: o RE: rectified tile and grout joints... am I asking too much? Brought to you by Advertisement clip this post email this post what is this? see most clipped and recent clippings PrintPage * Posted by floorman67 (My Page) on Wed, Aug 9, 06 at 16:51 I have never heard the term rectified tile and I have been a licensed and certified installation mechanic for 27 years, so no, it isn't disturbing at all ... I have heard the term, Dimensionally Stable Tile though. two occurrances can prevent successful 1/16" grout joints. one being nominal tile sizing (tiles not exactly the same dimension as every other tile), and two being the existing floors height variances that would cause a run-off. When attempting to install a 1/16" grout joint with either present can cause tile stepping and run off becasue there is basically no joint to make it up in the installation grid system layed out prior to install. TO answer your question, no, it is impossible. However, the above considerations play an important role in it's success. Since you house is older and admittedly not perfect, you want to research and find an installation professional comfortable with this, and expect to pay a handsome fee because basically they will be either installing a mud bed, or mudding the tiles in over a backer unit (a hybrid technique), which it time consuming and not a well known technique to every ceramic installer, especially those who only do thinset/backer board installations. Many refuse to do it becasue of tile nominal sizing, extra time involved, the difficulty factors, and the lack of knowledge to pull it off successfully. This doesnt mean they are bad installers. On the contrary it means they care enough to admit they can't do it, so they refuse to do it. and them some jsut do not know the difference and think it cant be done successfully, but still install great projects all the time. I would keep searching until you find a installation mechanic who can do it. The key is the tiles dimensions from tile to tile. If they are the exact same with no variance, then it can be done. o RE: rectified tile and grout joints... am I asking too much? Brought to you by Advertisement clip this post email this post what is this? see most clipped and recent clippings PrintPage * Posted by bill_vincent (billvincent@hotmail.com) on Wed, Aug 9, 06 at 22:19 I would not install rectified porcelain, even large format rectified porcelain, any other way than with a tight 1/16" joint. That said, there's atleast one installer in my area who, in every other way, is one of the best in the area, and he won't do it, either-- not even with 12x12 rectified porcelain or natural stone-- says it can't be done, in spite of the pics I've shown him of my work. I agree with the salesperson-- don't give up. Stick to your guns. Floorman-- the biggest way that rectified differs from other porcelain (or other tiles, for that matter) is that while all other tile, porcelain or otherwise, are stamped out to size before going into the kiln, rectified porcelain goes into the kiln in sheets, and then is cut to size afterward. If you ever see it, it'll have the same exact edge as polished stone tile, with the cutting ridges and the chamfered edge. This is why no matter what the size of the tile, it can be set tight, because the tolerances are alot stricter than they are for other tiles. You'll see less variation in size with rectified porcelain than you will even with polished stone. o RE: rectified tile and grout joints... am I asking too much? Brought to you by Advertisement clip this post email this post what is this? see most clipped and recent clippings PrintPage * Posted by girlwithaspirin (My Page) on Wed, Aug 9, 06 at 23:07 Whew. Thanks to both of you. Part of me thought I was being silly. You know, what's a couple sixteenths of an inch? But the joints on my kitchen ceramic are 3/16", and on my honed limestone, they're 2/16" -- and there's a huge aesthetic difference between those two. The 1/16" grout lines I've seen with rectified tile absolutely make the look, in my opinion. I'll stick to my guns. I think I need to shift my focus and make sure I'm calling in natural stone installers.

All these places in NJ, I live near and I plan to go to them for my kitchen tile. Thank you! Now I am wondering if I should take a look for my foyer areas before calling my installer to change my Lowe's Rialto Beige to Rialto White. I plan to do hardwood in all the main areas but I want Porcelain Tile in the kitchen and the two entrance areas. I love the Rialto Beige but it only looks nice in my front foyer and is too dark in the middle foyer in between the dining room and living room by the bathroom, coat closet, utility room (that had the flood from the central air conditioner unit dying on me and the engineered wood floors are going to be replaced with tile) and garage. I changed the bulb to the maximum 100 watts but the area has no natural light like the front entrance has. Hence, despite the grayish/taupe/off-white color, the Rialto Beige looks like real stone to me and looks nice in both areas. I just hope the Pits are not too difficult to clean. Or should I tell the installer to wait and check out these others places that I plan to check out anyway after my deadlines for my kitchen? I already had gone to Wayne tile and they were so nice but I could not find a tile that I loved as much as the Rialto Series that too me looks like real stone.

There are so many porcelain flooring choices and some tile companies are still regional. Hard to recommend something over the internet. Really need to take your samples into the tile store and find what you like and what's in your budget. With a pattern like the Berwyn what I would want to do is find flooring and backsplash that picks up colors in the quartz so you get unity across the kitchen. With something like Berwyn you can go in a lot of directions because there are so many colors to pick from. Will your kitchen designer help select the floor? If she has the vision we've found it best to let one person tie it together rather than trying to have a half dozen different designers pulling you in different directions.