Bathroom Tile Designs: 7 Ways to Add Style and Save $$
It’s very easy to make your bathroom tile designs much more stylish than a field of plain square tiles, by adding special colors, shapes, or patterns of tiles. I’ll show you 7 ways to add pizazz to your design without pushing the cost through the roof.
1. Add color bands or panels
Instead of tiling a wall or shower surround in the same color of tile all over, you can break up the expanse of single color tile and create interest by using one or more different tile colors of the same type and size. The way you use the colors to make patterns, and the colors you pick, will affect how the pattern looks: a checkerboard of high contrast colors will wake you up and energize you, while a subtle stripe of similar colors will be more soothing.
2. Add a liner stripe
“Liner” or border tiles are long thin tiles which form a stripe or border when used with field tiles. While liners are more expensive, you don’t have to use many of them to get the effect you’re after. You could create a bordered panel, add a stripe round the edge of your tiled area, or include just one stripe at wasit or eye level. Other good uses are as borders round windows, doors or fixtures. Another way to get a narrow stripe is to use the long narrow glass tiles which are in fashion at the moment. These are sometimes called “mtchstick” tiles and they come on a mesh backing by the square foot, like mosaic tiles. You can easily buy a few square feet and cut the tiles off the backing to use them as stripes.
3. Use a different layout
The most basic layout for tile is a plain, lined-up horizontal column / vertical row design. Without even changing your tile colors you can add interest by changing the layout: perhaps use a brick-style “running bond” (this works with square tiles as well as subway tiles), or set a panel of tiles “on point”. You can get much more complex if you want to – try adapting one of the many quilt block designs – but you may find that the more complex your design, the more important it is to feature the complex part as a panel surrounded by a simple layout.
4. Use different grout
Grout that is the same color as your tiles will make the joint lines less visible, and the tiles themselves and their color(s) will take over as the main design element. Contrasting grout lines make the tile layout itself “pop out” so if you’re using special or complex layouts as part of your design, an appropriate grout color is important to make them visible. If you have a really complex layout, a mild contrst may be a good choice so that the layout reads, but is not overwhelming visually. Grout line widths can also be adjusted to get different effects.
5. Use different shaped tile
Not all tiles are square! Rectangular tiles of different proportinons are readily available, from the currently-popular subway tiles to long, skinny glass tiles called matchsticks. There are many other shapes too: octagons and hexagons, circles, triangles, petals, flowers and leaves, pebbles, ogees, even hearts! Mosaics are currently very popular and can consist of shapes other than squares, too.
6. Add a feature panel
Painted tiles are often expensive, but you can still feature them without breaking the bank. A painted panel or set of painted tiles surrounded by one or more borders makes a great feature on the back of a shower or tub surround, or anywhere else where you have a large expanse of tile. Individual painted tiles can also be scattered through a field of plain tile.
7. Use patterned tile
Tile with printed patterns evokes some decorative periods we may want to forget (though even the seventies are starting to come back into fashion), but it’s also typical of specific styles from many areas of the world. An entire bathroom done in moorish patterned tiles might feel a bit overwhelming to you, though to someone else it might feel wonderful – but you can always feature patterned tiles in a panel or limited area, and surround with borders and plain tile.
As you can see, there are many, many ways to customize and personalize your tilework with different bathroom tile designs. Don’t settle for something boring when you can have “The Unusual” so easily.
