This concrete slab was what’s under the carpet that we took out of this guest bedroom. The homeowner wants to convert this guest room into a home office. So, today we’re going to help do that by laying a gorgeous tile floor.
I’m using porcelain tiles from Daltile and I’m going to lay this in a pattern mixing 6 and 12 inch tiles. The first step in laying a tile floor is to find the center point of the room. Also since we’re doing all of our work on the concrete, it’s a good idea if you have knee pads to go ahead and put them on. Now what you want to do is measure from one wall to the other wall to find your center point. Okay, I’ve got 134 so half of that is right here at 67. Also I'm going to measure from this wall over here to the other wall. Got 122 and half of that is right here at 61. Okay and this is our center point of the room.
Now I’ve laid a tile in the center of the room and I’ve done a dry layout of the tiles, going in this direction. This way I can find out, how wide my boarder tiles need to be. Now remember you need to leave about a quarter of an inch for your grout line, so this boarder tile needs to be cut at 7 inches. Because I’ve started in the center of the room, now all of my boarder tiles along this wall and the opposite wall will be the same width. To find out the width of the boarder tiles on this wall and that wall, I’m just going to repeat the process and do another dry layout in that direction.
I did the dry layout to the other wall and it turns out those boarder tiles need to be 7 inches wide as well. So all of my boarder tiles are going to be cut at 7 inches. Now I’m using a tile cutter with and adjustable stop. I’ve set this at 7 inches. If you have a large project you might consider buying one of these and you can usually get one for less than a hundred dollars. But if you just have a smaller project like we’re doing, you can also rent this.
Okay, I’m going to place the tile in here and just make sure it’s square right here, and then I’m going to score it across to make the cut. All right , and there you have a nice clean cut. Now that all of the boarder tiles are cut, it’s time to mix the thin set. The thin set is the adhesive that actually bonds the tile to the concrete floor. Now I’m using a powder thin set and we’re going to add it to water and then mix it until it’s about the consistency of toothpaste. Okay that’s the right consistency, and now I’m ready to start laying down some tile.
I’m just going to start with a small area and spread this out with a notch trowel. Over here. Now, you don’t want to cover a big area just enough to get yourself started. All right I’m ready for the first piece, and this is my boarder, corner tile, which I’ve cut at a 7 inch square, and you want to put just enough pressure and work it back and forth just a little bit to set the tile. Now remember to put 2 spacers in between each tile as you work, just like this, and you’ll notice that I’m starting in the corner. It’s a good idea to do this, and that way you can work yourself backwards to the doors, so you don’t toll yourself into a corner.
All right I’ve got all of the boarder tiles installed along these two walls, and now I’m ready to start on my pattern. I’m using 3 sizes, the 12 x 12, 6 x 6, and the 12 x 6. To get the 12 x 6’s all you have to do is cut your 12 x 12 in half. Now keep in mind with tile, you can design any pattern that you want. But if you like to copy our pattern, just visit our website. Now I’m just going to continue laying this pattern all around the room. When you’re setting the tiles, you want to try to drop this in place as close to where that you need to be as possible. You don’t want to slide your tiles too much because if you do the thin set will roll up in between the tiles and fill up your grout line.
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