July 26, 2006
The Backsplash Tile Story
For the most part, Ronda and I have agreed readily on design elements of the new kitchen. There have been a couple of rough spots where we each liked something different, but in the end found a compromise. Sometimes the compromise was better than either of our initial choices. A good example of this is the granite we chose for the countertop. Ronda was tending toward lighter granite that had a speckled pattern. I was leaning toward darker material that had a more subdued pattern. We were at an impasse until we found a reddish granite with a veined pattern called "Summer Red" at the supplier we ended up buying from. At the time that we were disagreeing, it seemed like the granite would be the feature that one of us would end up disappointed with. Now we both love the color and can't wait to see it installed. Other pieces of the kitchen we agreed upon quickly and moved forward. We also struggled with features that we agreed upon but couldn't seem to find available anywhere.
The most recent of these was the tile for the backsplash. The floor tile hadn't been a problem. Even the accent tile we wanted for the backsplash wasn't initially a problem. The biggest problem was choosing the "field" tile, the generic tile that will surround the decorative accent tiles. We looked at the usual places, but even where there were large selections of tile everything seemed to be the wrong color or the screening used to apply the pattern to the tile was too obvious or -- something. By chance we bought a magazine called American Bungalow, which concentrates on the traditional design of the period the house was built in. Inside there was an ad for Handcraft Tile, a tile manufacturer that was in nearby Milpitas.
Ronda made an appointment with Sarah, who happened to be the new owner. It turns out that Handcraft Tile has been in business since 1926 and is one of the oldest tile factories in the country. When Disney built the Grand Californian Hotel at their new California Adventure theme park, they tapped Handcraft Tile for the tile work. I wasn't able to go with Ronda on that first visit, but her enthusiasm afterward made me realize that I needed to make time to go the next time around. She brought back some samples and they were exactly what we had been looking for. Each tile had a uniqueness about its shape and color that gave it character while still looking uniform with other tiles in an installation. It was obvious that this was where we were going to end up buying our tile.
We made another appointment with Sarah to go over some final design decisions and purchase the tile. It was a lunchtime excursion to Milpitas, so we had a limited amount of time. We still ended up talking with Sarah for a solid hour. Ronda was right, I had the exact opposite reaction to their tile samples that I had to the retail store's tile samples. I don't think there was a display in the shop that I didn't like. The entry had some samples of tiled steps (along with a desk and printer with a sign that said, mysteriously, "Kansas"). The manufacturing part of the enterprise was on the left, and the office and samples were to the right. There were tiles placed in display patterns all over the walls and shelves full of more samples everywhere. In the middle of the room were four big work tables with what I guess were a number of customer orders in progress. One order was a number of commemorative tiles for the Grand Californian.
We sat down with Sarah and I immediately realized she was a sort of "kindred spirit" when it came to our feelings about design and appreciation of the artifacts that came out of the Arts & Crafts era. We talked a bit about the house and Ronda happened to mention the fireplace, which is made up of tile that looks like cobblestone, with a keystone tile containing a picture. Sarah was interested in hearing more about the tile, which I thought may have been manufactured by another old San Jose area tile manufacturer, S&S Tile.
While I described the keystone tile, she went and retrieved a coffee table book about California Tiles and turned to a particular page. She pointed to one of the tiles and asked if the keystone tile looked anything like it. I told her that if that wasn't the exact tile, it was very close. Apparently, the tile on the fireplace was originally made by Handcraft Tile back when the house was new! We had her make a photocopy of the page in the book and couldn't help but go by the house before heading back to work. Sure enough, it was exactly the same tile! It turns out they only knew of two other examples of this tile in existence. Two exciting finds from a chance discovery that came out of frustration with what we initially found before digging deeper. It turns out that some tiles we had salvaged from a neighbor’s remodeling efforts were the same as my fireplace, too. Unfortunately, the keystone tile was broken in two. Handcraft Tile is going to take a look and see if they can come up with a way to repair it. You just never know what you’re throwing out unless you investigate, I guess.
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Posted by Rob at July 26, 2006 10:19 AM