I don't have any pictures so I tried to mock one up.

I would do the black border tile up each side and around the top of the shower.

I would also do a row of black tile at the bottom of the walls - that seemed to be very common then as well .

Sounds like a fun bathroom

Good luck!

Thanks--yes, should have mentioned that we will have a base trim of 6"x6" black (and the curb will be black tile with a black stone top).

Often subway tile manufacturers sell bullnose tiles which have a rounded edge to finish off layouts with no end edge (like a cabinet bottom).

Yes, pretty sure we will use Daltile trim pieces (assuming it plays nicely with our field tile--that company also makes various trim pieces, but is much more expensive and requires me getting all of the details right on the front end, which I'm not confident of!) We will use bullnose on the sides and cove base along the bottom, but just not sure what to do at the top--we could end the tile just shy of the ceiling and use bullnose there too, or use standard tile along the ceiling and just caulk the edge. The tile in our existing bathroom ends a foot shy of the ceiling and uses bullnose, but we don't love that and all else being equal, would prefer to tile all the way up. But now I understand why they went that route... :)

i'm not sure if this is true of all tilers, but I conferred with our tiler about this same topic when he was preparing to do our shower recently. And he said he uses the regular tile so the grout line can be straight/flat at the top so when the ceiling is painted it can be a clean edge. He used the trim piece tiles only at the sides up to the top. Maybe some pro's will chime in on this one.

artemis78 are you using Daltile or someone else for your field tile?

Are you 100% certain that your ceiling is level/plumb/flush? If there's any variance, it will be magnified if you go up to the ceiling and try to put some kind of trim up there. That is why Jack suggest just going with the field tile, and then any fudging can be done with grout match caulk.

You can check out my profile, we have a similar alcove tub and chose to stop the tile at 6'8" where it abuts a window for a natural transition. We used cap trim on top and then there are 2 more feet of untiled walls until you get to the ceiling.

Are you doing glass shower doors or is it going to be open with a curtain? We have a semi-enclosed shower in a room with a much lower ceiling and I have to repaint it a decent amount because moisture condenses. On that smaller one, I definitely wish we had tiled the ceiling.

Here's what I did with our tile and black trim. Hope that helps a bit. We used Daltile for the walls.

I would use a flat tile at the ceiling intersection, whether it is green or black. Bullnose for tile that ends on the wall.

I want to reinforce what kats737 said earlier. It's likely that your ceiling is not going to be 100% plumb with the walls. We found this when doing one of the bathrooms in our previous home and regretted tiling up to the ceiling (however, in that case, the ceiling was less than 8 feet, which is what led us to do it in the first place). If you attempt to tile all the way to the ceiling the out of plumb situation will be glaringly obvious. If you have a nine foot ceiling you don't need to go all the way to the top. We just did the master bath in our current home (which has nine foot ceilings) and stopped a little above the height of the door molding. Exactly where you end will depend on where it makes the most sense with the tile pattern, and possibly also where the shower head plumbing is. I would run the black bullnose around the top edge.

Love the green and black - it's my favorite mid-20th century color combination. :-)

Thanks, all! I am 100% certain our ceiling is not plumb with the walls--even the floor there is not quite level sadly. (105-year-old house!) In our kitchen we used moulding and just scribed it to the ceiling, but trickier (and more noticeable) to do with tile of course. Not sure exactly how high our shower head yet, but it will be mounted on the side wall (vs. on the ceiling). We are planning B&W Tile for our field tile since they have the color we want, but hoping to mix this with Daltile for the trim (partly for cost, and largely because we can get that locally, so we can refine the details and/or return or swap pieces easily as we get into the tiling). We have window moulding immediately adjacent to the shower that stops at 7', so could also make the tile even with that, which will still be a bit higher than the tile in our existing bathroom. We have had to repaint that several times over the years, but the most recent paint job with Aura Bath & Spa is still doing well at seven years. And of course I realize if we tile all the way up, we'll have a different task of having to clean the grout that high, which is a different challenge!

We are undecided on glass door vs. curtain, but are designing to accommodate a glass door now or in the future. The shower will be open to the room above the door, though (vs. enclosed, since the fan will be right outside the shower enclosure).

I'm not a tile expert, but as far as the pencil tile goes, I would either place it at the same level as it is on the existing walls, or up top at the same distance from the last tiles at ceiling height to repeat the pattern from the existing wainscot tiling.

You probably won't have to clean the grout that high. Get a good quality epoxy grout as long as your installer knows how to mix it properly. I have had our bath for 6 years and only give it a quick over with scrubbing bubbles every other month or so, and only where the water hits for the most part.

If you are wanting white though, maybe use just a touch of gray, so that you're not driving yourself crazy as it starts to age.

We are definitely not white grout people! :D Thinking oyster gray but waiting for the tile to be in hand to test it out. I love the look of white grout, but we are not cut out for it, sadly...