Monday, October 20, 2008

Help me finish my basement (bar) floor tile mosaic

So I've got an idea. It's not an original idea and it's an idea that will drive my wife nuts but I think it could be cool none the less. It all depends on how much cooperation we get.I have a handful of projects to do to consider the basement "complete". I hope to have these done by Thanksgiving. They mostly involve trim and touch-up paint except for one big area: the bar floor. It's currently my daughter's play kitchen floor but hopefully it will one day become a bar. When we started the rehab, we had this bright idea that we'd collect ceramic and porcelain tile samples and do a mosaic floor there. Here it is, two years later, and we have a small handful of misc. tiles. Not very reassuring. Here's where the idea comes in. What if we could collect tiles from all over the US and beyond? What if we could get tiles that other folks are tearing out of their homes and recycle them in ours? Hopefully people do and are willing to send them to us so that we can incorporate them into our floor mosaic. I don't care about color, patterns, or shape. Variation will only make the floor more interesting.

I'm only looking for one or two tiles from each other person. Also, I can't reimburse for postage so you'd really be doing this just for fun. Hmm, I can surely come up with a neat way to individually thank everyone that participates (maybe I should have thought this through before publicizing). Anyway, do you have any tile that is just hanging around or removed from your house and awaiting disposal? If so, and if you'd like to see them installed in the Tiny Bungalow, please send them to:

Tiny Oak Park Bungalow
c/o Harold O. Schulz Co. 2124 Ashland Avenue Evanston, IL 60201

5 comments:

Jennifer said...

Ceramic only, or will you take stone?

Chris said...

I'm sure I could work in stone as well as long as it isn't too thick.

sweetlenny said...

I sent some tiles your way. They're in my pantry AND bathroom!

Anonymous said...

I have the opposite problem, lots of odd bits of tile, now I'm looking for ideas. Shipping from where I live to you might be a bit expensive, but I have a story that might help.

I've been thinking about trying my hand at tile mosaic and stopped in at a local carpet/flooring store just to see what they had available and to price it. The girlfriend of my brother's brother-in-law works there, so while we were chatting, I mentioned that I was thinking of trying my hand at tile and she told me that when tile is discontinued, the store puts its sample boards out the back of the store for anyone to take. The majority of these so far have been porcelain floor tiles ranging in size from 13x13 up to 20x20, but there have been all kinds. They cleaned out their back room this summer and I hauled away a 5' high stack.

I've scored a few boards from one of the other stores in town as well, though I've had no luck yet at the 3rd store. I've got hundreds of pounds of tiles now and this is a small town.

I've thought of a few other sources that I may try in the future, but first I'd better try to use what I have already.

Good Luck!

Chris said...

Thanks Marion, I've gotten a bit of tile already. People have been great. I'll have to post about it because I am almost there. I'm in the construction profession so sample boards are not hard to come by. I may fill in the rest with tile from these.