Facts about Stone and Installation

  
 

The selection of the right material for your remodel of construction is one of the most important decisions you need to make. The experts of Custom Designed Kitchens & Bath can help you select the best material for your kitchen or bath, whether it is countertop of flooring. Each stone, whether a natural stone like Granite or Marble, or Synthetic Stone, or manufactured Tiles have certain characteristics which can either highlight the beauty of your new or remodeled home, or take away from the ultimate goal. Our experts can help you with this selection and work with you as a team.


What to look for.

Is it first quality Stone ?
 Many vendors represent their products as 1st quality. However, the definition of what "1st quality" actually means is illusory. There is no "STANDARD" definition of what constitutes 1st quality to which stone vendors are required to adhere. Quarry owners, tile producers, importers and retail outlets each may set their own criteria to define what they consider "1st quality" stone. The characteristics of stone vary by color, type, composition, age and depth. Depending on the structure and character of the stone at that particular quarry or tile producer stone will be classified in an infinite number of manners. This is why it is important to buy natural stone products from a vendor you trust because reality is that ANY stone no matter how poor its condition can legally be called "1st Quality". 

However, in flooring applications some anomalies which are so abhorrent in one application actually add beauty and elegance in another.  For example: A marble of lower quality exhibits a beautiful vein structure more typically associated with marble. Our advice to customers is that if they are looking for a high degree of uniformity and clarity in a flooring tile application then save your money and go buy a good micro-polished porcelain product. We don’t sell them, but there are some excellent imitations of natural stone products on the market today, AT A FRACTION OF THE PRICE that the highest quality stone would cost….and each is an exact strident replica of the other. Part of the beauty of natural stone in flooring applications are the veins, the color variation, striation and an infinite number of other anomalies from fossils to fractures that create the look and feel of natural stone. Some of the most beautiful floors in the world are created using some of the lowest "quality" stone available!

Granite and Marble usually come in slabs and will be cut depending on your layout and need. A qualified company will measure, layout, template and install everything for you. More info can be found on the Granite and Marbel pages

For flooring and or Tiles there are however, certain physical characteristics that are very important to insure an efficient and aesthetically pleasing finished product.

SQUARENESS
It is very important that each tile is squared. The smaller the grout line the more critical this issue becomes. 

CALIBRATION
Slightly less important is calibration. Calibration refers to the thickness of the tile…or more precisely the closeness of thickness that one tile has to the others. If floor tile is not properly calibrated and every piece is thicker or thinner than the last the installer must expend extra time and effort to level the surface of each tile relative to those around it.

FINISH
There are a number of common finishes. The most common are polished (a mirror shine), honed (a duller satin matte), flamed (a rough sandy texture) and brushed (a smooth dimpled matte finish surface with a texture very similar to the surface of a golf ball). Brushed finishes are often used when creating a “tumbled” style tile in combination with chipped edge and corner treatments. Of all of the finishes, highly polished finishes are the most critical followed by the honed finish. 

CHIPPED CORNERS AND EDGES
Normally if you purchase any substantive quantity of tile there will be some small percentage of the tile that will arrive with a chipped or broken corner or perhaps even a broken tile or two. Question the credibility of any vendor who claims otherwise. Buyers should not become overly alarmed at the presence of a limited number of these tiles. Some plants will actually pack up to 3% in this condition at the time of manufacturing. This is still usable tile. 

FISSURES AND FRACTURES
Things like fissures are in fact weak spots on the stone…but in recent years with the advent of epoxying and/or netting technologies which dramatically improve the strength of these stones, even these are becoming less of a problem….and in some stone types unavoidable. Natural stone floor tile is supposed to be just that…natural, varying, ever changing…as in nature. Remember, imperfection is the art and perfection of natural stone.

FILL
Some stone types, such as travertine, have naturally occurring hollow gas pockets created as the stone is formed in the ground. When sliced into tile, much like pieces of bread in a loaf, these hollow pockets are exposed as holes in the stone. In flooring applications it is necessary to fill these holes so they don’t collect dust and dirt creating sanitation issues. Travertine can be purchased either factory "filled" or "unfilled".

Imperfection is the art and beauty of the material.
In summary, it is very important to buy a "mechanically correct" tile in a flooring application. Beyond that, beauty is in the eye of the beholder. Variations like color range, veining, motion and striation are simply a matter of personal preference and the look, style and feel you are attempting to achieve. The more consistent and homogeneous a product you desire, the more you should expect to spend in a natural stone product. For example you can buy nice mechanically correct good quality 18-inch travertine floor tile for around $3.50 per square foot delivered in the United States. That same product in a true imperfection free stone would be three or four times that amount…. This is the consumer knowledge gap in which most stone vendors play. Our expert will be able to help you with this