Although it looks intricate as hell, the herringbone is very simply, a brick joint pattern with every other tile turned on its side. Look at the pattern for a minute. You'll see that first the horizontal tiles look like steps, with each step being exactly a 1/2 tile advanced from the last. Then comes the vertical tiles doing the same thing. Then back to the horizontal tiles, and so on. Once you get going with it, it's really not as complicated as it looks. The only disadvantage is that your grout joint is predetermined by the tile size. If you lay two tiles longways side by side right next to a single tile cappling the ends of the two tiles, move the first two so their long edge is flush with either end of the capping tile. Whatever you have for a joint between the two tiles is what you're going to use for a grout joint throughout the floor. No ifs, ands, or buts.

Before I answer, I have to tell you first, this is still Bill Vincent. Now that GW has changed over to houzz, it defaults to my houzz profile which is my company name, Creative Ceramic & Marble. Now, btnik-- to answer your question, I charge more on the floors, because it's a little tougher to keep the tile flush on the floor, thanks to gravity. On the walls, especially with a nonsag thinset, they pretty much stay where I put them. Only issue is making sure I shim them to keep the joints aligned, which is why I charge more for ALL wall installations than I do ALL floor installations. But in comparison to other floor installations, I will charge a little more for large format because of the buttering and scraping involved to keep the floor flat.

We encountered something similiar with about a 2" on the end of one wall, however we were going with the tile vertical and stacked above one another. We had a professional, who laid our tile in the majority of our house come over to answer a question we had about the window in the shower and before Hubs could even ask him about that, he looked at Hubs layout and said, "you never have that small of tile on the end of a wall." That and the issue of the window had us re evaluating everything. He wanted us to bricklay the tile (12x24, like yours with 1/8 grout line), as he said that was the way to solve any issues. That wasn't the look I wanted so we started over and Hubs, with the help of some people on here, finally came up with a solution. We ended up going horizontal but matching grout lines. Before any tile is laid though, make sure your tile is actually 12x24. Ours was actually a little less than 12 and a little less than 24. That little bit adds up when you only want 1/8" grout line and you are dealing with a small bit on the end of a wall. I didn't want bricklay pattern as I wanted a flow from the floor to the shower since we are having a 39" glass panel and 30" glass door. So far, it has taken hubs a couple of weeks to cut and lay the tile himself, but all the grout lines are even and we are down to finishing the bullnose and the floor. If you are wanting the bricklay pattern, then your tile guy's solution might work. Try drawing it out on the computer and see what it looks like. That's what Hubs did and it helped me see what he was wanting to do, or draw it out on the shower wall itself.

Thanks, everyone! Here's another factor I didn't mention... my contractor told me that my wall was really out of plumb... If he were to straighten up the walls, I'd lose 4" in width on the toilet back wall. I made a choice - maybe the wrong one - that I'd take unevenly cut floor tile over losing 4" in a narrow space. So, if the tiles go longways, opposite the floor planks, the "off" cuts would be the long part of the tiles, and probably significantly more obvious than if the short end of tiles are cut... That may end up being my deciding factor.