Tile
Waterline, spillways, risers and the walls of a covered room.
Tile is a small line item that people remember, because it sits at eye level in the water and on every wall you lean against. Everything here is a material family — glass, porcelain, ceramic, stone mosaic — described by how it behaves rather than who makes it.
7 of 7 tile in this category
- WaterlineColour families — we hold no photograph of this finish on one of our own projects
Glass mosaic waterline tile
Small glass squares on mesh sheets. Glass has depth that ceramic does not — it changes colour as the light moves — and it is the single most effective way to change what colour the water reads as.
- WaterlineColour families — we hold no photograph of this finish on one of our own projects
Porcelain waterline tile
Larger, flatter and quieter than glass, in a straightforward field format. Less joint to keep clean, less sparkle, noticeably less money.
- Waterline
Hand-painted deco tile
Patterned ceramic — the blue-and-white Spanish-influenced band you see on a lot of San Diego pools. Every tile is painted, so no two runs match exactly, and that is the point.
- WaterlineColour families — we hold no photograph of this finish on one of our own projects
Stone mosaic waterline
Marble, travertine or pebble chips on sheets. Matte where glass is bright, and the way to make a waterline disappear into a natural-looking pool instead of drawing a line around it.
- Feature & spillwayColour families — we hold no photograph of this finish on one of our own projects
Glass spillway tile
The tile on a spa wall or a raised water feature, where water runs over it constantly. Chosen for how it looks wet, which is not how it looks in the sample tray.
Floors & wallsWood-look porcelain plank
Long porcelain planks printed as timber. Under a solid cover it gives an outdoor room a floor rather than a slab, and unlike real wood it does not care about sprinklers, sunscreen or dogs.
Floors & wallsHerringbone wall tile
Small-format tile laid on a diagonal repeat, used to give the back wall of a covered kitchen or bar a texture that catches raking light. Pattern doing the work that colour usually does.
Nobody should pick tile off a screen
Colour on a monitor is a guess, and a surface you will walk on barefoot for fifteen years is not a guess worth making. We put real samples in front of you at the design consultation, in daylight, next to each other — including the ones we would talk you out of.