Tiling throughout the house

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Is it a good idea to tile throughout the ground floor of my house?

Some ideas take off and spread like wild fire. This has definitely been one of those....in the world of tiles anyway!

A day doesn't seem to go by without someone calling up and uttering the same famous words: "I'm looking to tile my whole ground floor with large porcelain tiles, what do you have?"

Tiling throughout the entire ground floor of a house seems to be getting more and more popular. There are certain characteristics of this project which seem to be more common than others; the tile being an extra large size, usually polished and usually a marble effect.

Here we have summarised why it's a good idea to tile throughout your entire ground floor and what it means in practical terms:

1. To give an ambience of spaciousness and grandeur

In layman's terms this means making your home look bigger. The same large porcelain tile laid throughout an area gives an impression of it being larger and more spacious. This is amplified by the tile being an extra large size such as 60x60cm, 80x80cm or 60x120cm. A lot of people try to go for a seamless look with a very small grout joint or no grout joint to give an appearance of continuation, make sure the tile is rectified to do this.

2. It's more cost effective

If you're buying one type of tile in bulk for the whole floor compared to 3 or 4 types for different rooms you will naturally save money as you will likely get a better price for the bulk tile. As well as this you will have less wastage and cuts compared to having wastage for each different type of tile.

3. To give a more flowing and unified effect

This is usually achieved by using a marble effect tile. With large projects which are tiled with marble effect tiles the flow created by the continuous and natural looking marble veins gives a more airy, breezy and relaxing feel compared to a clinical feel a plain white or grey tile might produce.

These days marble effect tiles are so unique and original that you can really bring some bright, warm and energetic colours in to your home to give a continuous, spacious and light mood. Blue and gold veined marble effect tiles are definitely getting more and more popular.

4. Easier to clean and maintain

Usually when someone is tiling their whole floor they go for a polished porcelain tile. This is mainly because they are easier to clean and keep clean. They show marks less and the strong polish on tiles these days makes them hard to stain. People do worry about polished tiles being a hazard and slippery when wet but realistically polished tiles only become truly hazardous when outside under rain and snow. Saying that we can't ignore the fact that they could potentially be hazardous inside, for example in bathrooms. The most common solution people find is to lay a matt where ever tends to get wet the most, such outside the bath or shower and at the entrance of the house.

5 Underfloor heating

 When people are considering a project like this there is usually one sticking point - tiling the living room floor. They tend to think that tiles on the living room floor will bring a touch of cold. They can slowly see their image of the cosy and warm home life disappear. The solution is underfloor heating. These days electric underfloor heating is so efficient and easy to work with that it shouldn't be a worry. It can be less costly than central heating and you have much more flexibility as it's electric.

Another factor is that you can put it only where you need it, such as the centre of the living room floor, of the kitchen and some in the bathroom. This way you don't need to wastefully heat areas which don't need it.

This doubt regarding the coldness of tiles is an illusion and it shouldn't stop you achieving that clean, fresh,  spacious look you've been dreaming about. Compared to the stale and stuffy feel a carpet in the living room will bring we think it's obvious what people are choosing these days.

6. It just looks much better

Last but not least a tiled floor just look much better. How ever many years have gone by since it has been laid, a good scrub with a bucket and mop can always bring out the best of polished tiles and you can once again have that shinny, clean sparkling look in your home.

  • Kerem Kilicay