Backsplash Tiling

Prep

On a Sunday afternoon, when I should have been studying, Alex and I discussed our concerns in the space and decided to remove the granite surrounding the countertops.  I’d noticed in a number of kitchens that the tiles seemed to extend directly from the countertop to cabinets, and thought that removing the darker colored granite would allow for more of the light-colored tile to be seen.  We loosened both the clear caulk between the counter and the surround, and the white caulk between the surround and drywall with a utility knife, then wedged a 5-in-1 between the surround and drywall and tapped lightly to wedge it out, moving down each piece to loosen and pulling from the wall.  The pieces with edges exposed had begun to crack, and I was not sorry to see that go!  Alex agreed it looked much better and already lessened the darkness in the room.

After ordering and purchasing some additional materials, we called our neighborhood hardware store to reserve a tile saw and plotted out the weekend.  Friday I tried to return the kitchen to order after finals and Alex's work travel, and prepped some food for over the weekend.  Saturday afternoon we picked up the tile saw.  Alex cleared the  remaining countertop residents into the dining room, and set up the saw on the deck - thank you weather for holding out for us! He familiarized himself with the tile and practiced with some dummy cuts on the sheet of tile I'd tried out tools on, and prepared the half pieces needed to start at the edges.

Inside, I finished removing the surround from the sink side of our kitchen, sanded down caulk and edges left by removal, scrub walls, remove caulk remnants from counters*, “final” cleaning, repeat, repeat, repeat.
*this will be going on for a while – just me and a razor blade and Netflix

Alex used a 10” wet saw that we rented for a bit more than 24 hours.  For the layout of the kitchen and the limited availability of tile shapes in this pattern, we decided to simply tile the two sides of the galley and end them at the outermost corners.  To start, he cut tiles in half, some vertically and some horizontally, for the alternating arabesque pattern, and we actually started with a little 90° angle piece in the corner.  We used a premixed thinset mortar and a wedged spreader to spread and comb.

Our tiles came on mesh but we opted for a different joint thickness, so removed the tiles and set them individually.  We used 1/16” spacers to set the tile, and found oblong wedges to be the best fit for our needs underneath, and X-shaped rubber spacers for in between the tiles vertically. After about 15 minutes, we determined that using spacers horizontally was not going to be a viable option.  Professional contractors would probably shudder, but this was literally our first rodeo and it was just not working.

The wall was only about 15 sq ft, but we didn’t really start tiling until 7. Around 11 we finished what was cut for that wall, not wanting to use the saw too late.

Sunday, we got off to a late start, due to dog belly rubs and getting moving in a compromised kitchen, but around 11 I started laying the tile while Alex worked on upper edge and outlet measurements and angles on the stove side.  When I reached the first outlet on the longer side Alex switched gears and did the miscellaneous cuts on that side, and lent his height to the project when we reached the sink.  I got pretty cranky at this point as the spacing seemed to be uncooperative, but he kindly checked it for me and informed me that I was nuts.  No, that it was right! I wish he could tell that to the tiles that were not quite fitting.  

We pressed on and were extremely thankful that some of the previously cut half tiles fit perfectly in a number of spaces. Of course, a downpour began an hour before we needed to leave to return the saw, so poor Alex carried the setup down three flights of stairs, soaked, while I got the car, and we loaded the actual saw up together.  We high-fived each other big time on this one and stopped for celebratory Thai; it’s basically the most substantial project we’ve done to date and this first step somehow finished within the timeframe we’d hoped.