DIY Project Diary ? Week 4

Well, the tiler didn?t turn up ? he hadn?t finished his previous job. We asked him to come over after work at least to look at the bathroom. I didn?t want any more surprises and I wanted to know how long it would take him to tile the whole bathroom. He came over on Monday evening and told us that big tiles cannot be cut around the wall mounted taps..

Also, it will be difficult to tile the recesses; despite the fact that we built the service box with the recesses according to the size of the tile. I mean the width of the recesses were the same as the width of the tile and the distance between the openings also corresponded to tile size. This was a waste of time. We decided to use mosaic tiles instead. Only on the wall that has the openings and taps. The other three walls remained to be tiled with the original tiles.

So I spent the next day sourcing mosaic tiles that would complement the big tiles, were reasonably priced and, most importantly, were available. I managed to find suitable ones but we had to drive to other side of town to collect them the next day? another day gone?

Yesterday the tiler arrived. I was pleased to show him the new tiles that I managed to get within two days. He now pointed out a new problem. The mosaic tiles (he calls them ?cubes? ) don?t line up properly with the width of the recesses and the distances between the openings don?t work with the width of the mosaic tiles. They would have to be cut individually? this would be a lot of work and would look rather ugly around the edges of the openings.

So we had to think again? We decided to adjust the service box and the recesses by adding the required width of plywood (screwed into the side panels) It took the whole day to sort this as we needed to adjust almost everything in order for the cubes to meet at the corners & edges.

The openings are now smaller than I designed them? but cest? la vie? The tiler didn?t do much the first day? but he?s costing us money ? although I instructed him to get on with tiling the other walls. For some reason he wanted to start with the bath panel and floor. He?ll be here over the weekend ? hopefully by the end of the week we?ll have a nice bathroom!

Today we?re making a new door ? a sliding door one that will have a full length & width mirror on the inside. It has special pop-out pulling handles at either end that will operate the door.

This project is just dragging on? we really have to move on to do the bedroom as we?re still sleeping on the floor on army mattresses.