In this snack-size episode of Home: The Second Story, we dive into tile—how to choose it, what to look out for, and the actual conversations we’re having with clients during the selection process. We start by grounding the discussion in what types of tile are available—ceramic, porcelain, stone, concrete—and how the location in the home helps determine the best fit. A shower floor needs very different performance qualities than a kitchen backsplash, and that’s where we begin the conversation with our clients.
We talk about size trends, especially the growing popularity of large-format tiles, which can be stunning but require proper floor engineering to prevent cracking. Grout comes up early and often—clients either love it or hate it. The good news is, grout technology has come a long way. Proper bath ventilation, newer formulations, and thoughtful layout planning can make grout maintenance much easier than it used to be.
From a design standpoint, we emphasize how tile adds texture, color, and customization to a space. But it's not all fun and games—functionality, safety, and long-term wear matter. We often work on aging-in-place projects, so slip resistance, surface glare, and visual accessibility become critical factors in tile decisions. Mosaic patterns, for example, may look great but can be disorienting for clients with vision impairments.
We rely heavily on trusted tile showrooms and reps to guide both us and our clients. These partnerships help streamline the process, especially when clients want to change shapes or colors midstream. Price is another big topic, and we encourage homeowners not to focus just on square foot costs but on where the tile will go. A $150/sq ft tile might be feasible in a small area like a bar backsplash, but less practical in a full shower.
Labor plays a huge role in tile cost and outcome. We advise always doing a dry lay, thinking carefully about transitions and edge details (hello, Schluter!), and planning for layout alignment—especially with plumbing fixtures and cabinetry. Even budget tile can shine if installed in a thoughtful pattern. Drawing tile layouts, aligning grout with niches and fixtures, and storyboarding during framing are all strategies we use to ensure beautiful, functional outcomes.
We wrap by encouraging listeners to work closely with their builders or tile reps if they don’t have a designer. Installation quality can make or break a tile project, so vetting your tile subcontractor is essential. There’s so much more to explore in the world of tile, and we’re definitely not done talking about it.
Snack Size - Tile
Speakers: Taylor Davis, Sheri Scott, & Marilyn Moedinger
[Music Playing]
Voiceover (00:03):
Everyone says how horrible it'll be to renovate or build your house — we're here to say, it doesn't have to be that way.
Join three seasoned architects as they interview homeowners who recently completed a large project, and ask them one simple question: what do you know now that you wish you knew before you started?
Welcome to Home: The Second Story Podcast.
Taylor Davis (00:26):
Hi, and welcome to our snack-size episode of Home: The Second Story. I'm Taylor from TPD Architect.
Sheri Scott (00:32):
I'm Sheri from Springhouse Architects.
Marilyn Moedinger (00:35):
And I'm Marilyn from Runcible Studios.
Taylor Davis (00:38):
Our topic for this morning is tile. We want to talk all things tile, and I will say we have just spent two days on vendor visits with clients looking at tile (so this is fresh in my mind), and want to get y’all's thoughts about tile and selection and what to look for and how to think about it, all the fun stuff.
It's such a fun finish to kind of work through but you've got so many design opportunities and so many ways to customize it. I'd love to hear how you all are thinking about tile these days.
Marilyn Moedinger (01:19):
So, tile is a huge topic. I feel like we'll address it again. I already know we're going to have more to talk about than we can fit in here.
Sheri Scott (01:27):
For sure.
Marilyn Moedinger (01:28):
Tile for me, it's a fun way to add color and texture and whatever. It's durable, all that kind of stuff. One of the first things that we are kind of diving into when it comes to selecting tile is type of tile. So, is it ceramic? is it porcelain? Is it stone? Is it whatever material, is it concrete?
And that material selection is going to automatically sort of put you down a certain track in terms of these are the shapes that are available and the colors that are available, and the best way to decide that, in my opinion, is the location of the tile.
So, you want a different kind of tile for your shower floor than you want for your kitchen backsplash. So, we start the tile story by listing all of the locations where we think we might want tile, and then we start to talk about what materials work well for those areas. That's how we get it started.
Sheri Scott (02:23):
We also talk about size. And a lot of our houses, we're doing more modern style, and so everyone wants the large format. And now, they have the huge formats that are four-foot by six-foot sheets.
Marilyn Moedinger (02:36):
Yeah, it's wild (laughs).
Sheri Scott (02:37):
It’s just incredible.
Taylor Davis (02:38):
It's unbelievable.
Sheri Scott (02:40):
It's so beautiful. I just saw some on a TikTok or something where they used those large format tiles for a kitchen backsplash instead of the small piece tiles which kitchen backsplashes is … this is such a huge topic.
Marilyn Moedinger (02:58):
I know (laughs).
Sheri Scott (02:59):
So, we do talk about size and just to be a nerd for a second, if you're using large format tiles on a floor, you need to make sure that that floor is engineered to be stiff enough so that the tiles don't crack.
Marilyn Moedinger (03:13):
Amen.
Taylor Davis (03:14):
That's a good note. You can't go into your 1850s house and throw large format tiles on the floor. Doesn't work that great.
Sheri Scott (03:21):
Right, right.
Marilyn Moedinger (03:22):
Nope.
Taylor Davis (03:23):
Speaking from our site visit yesterday, one of the things that came up was maintenance and tile, and all of the tile types that Marilyn just talked about all have kind of different properties associated with them. They have different porosity, they have different maintenance requirements. Do you need to seal them? How often do you need to seal them?
If you are doing any mosaic tiles, whether that's on the shower floor or on a wall somewhere, grout becomes a conversation, and people have very strong feelings about grout (laughs).
Marilyn Moedinger (04:00):
So strong.
[Laughter]
Taylor Davis (04:04):
They have very strong feelings about it. And some people don't care, they will get it clean, they will clean it themselves, they love it. Other people are like one grout line is one grout line, too many. So, I think what is your sort of tolerance? Finding out what our client's tolerances are for maintenance and upkeep is also going to be part of the driver of the tile conversation.
If they really don't like grout, then we're going to put a larger format tile on the walls and the floors to minimize that. But I think that that kind of plays into the selection process, is really kind of it's a little bit like a marble countertop.
Are you comfortable with a little bit of etching or a little bit of patina that shows up over time if you're looking at stone, or are you OCD and you want it to look like it does the day you install it 10 years from now. And so, thinking about those things, I think too, it's not necessarily fun, but it's critical (laughs) and sort of part of the conversation that you need to have when you're doing those tile selections.
Sheri Scott (05:12):
So, how do you guys start with that? Do you take your clients to a showroom where there's an expert that knows all that and keeps up on current topics?
Marilyn Moedinger (05:23):
Yes.
Taylor Davis (05:24):
Yep. A hundred percent.
Marilyn Moedinger (05:26):
I have certain tile showrooms that I've developed relationships with in the Boston area, and working on that in the Lancaster area since that's our new location in Pennsylvania. And part of it is like I learn their stock, they learn my ways of working, and when I bring my client into there, they're coming into an environment where we're going to be able to work really effectively for them.
And I also know the basics because we do all our interior design in house and so, I personally also know the basics of how tile works. And so, being in the showroom is super important. We do the thing where we order samples online and have them sent, but then you're getting it from a big company if there's like a problem, you're just dealing with some big company — having a rep in a showroom is huge.
We've got one that we're working on here in Pennsylvania and the rep has been so amazing. Like the client says, “You know what, I've changed my mind, I really want to try this other shape or this other color.” And then the rep goes and finds it, it saves me so much time (laughs).
Sheri Scott (06:31):
Right, right, and they know. Being a generalist with finishes, I feel like that's how I would define myself. Yes, I know the technical aspect and I know colors and I know my clients and I can guide them toward the right thing, but having that expert walk along with you side by side makes a huge difference in getting the right product for the right place.
Taylor Davis (06:56):
I want to bring up one other little point because it's important to our work. We do a lot of aging in place work, and surfaces are really critical. And so, we want to be thinking about slipperiness and preventing falls, and we do a lot of curbless showers.
So, tile is really critical when you're doing a curbless shower. You don't have a way to transition necessarily a curb to transition from one part of the floor to another part of the floor. So, how do those two pieces of tile intersect and interact? Where's the water going to go? So, understanding kind of where our clients are life-stage-wise actually impacts kind of them of the finished selections too. We want things that don't have a lot of glare.
I think one of the things we learned working with some particular clients is that people love sometimes a pattern on their floor, a mosaic pattern on the floor. And there are some folks for whom their vision conditions can deteriorate so that the mosaic pattern can be something so confusing that they don't want to walk into the space.
So, this is a lot of fun stuff, but it actually has some other implications kind of really on physically how people live in the bathroom or in the kitchen or wherever that is.
Marilyn Moedinger (08:16):
Yep. And I also want to bring that back to the grout conversation for a second because there's this idea that grout is bad. I just also want to say the grout that we have today, the products that we have today and the installation methods we have today, are so much better. Like this is not the grout of 20 years ago-
Sheri Scott (08:34):
Right. Absolutely.
Marilyn Moedinger (08:34):
That you have to scrub with a toothbrush every two weeks or else it grows mold. The other thing (by the way, announcement), when you have a good bath fan, your grout is way easier to clean because your bathroom isn't staying wet for that long.
So, if you have a good bath fan and you're exhausting all the steam, you have less of an issue. So, it isn't always just about the grout. So, just in defense of grout for a second. But also the slipperiness factor. So, we often say you need a tile in your shower that is grippier.
So, that often means the penny tiles that has a lot of grout because it's actually grippy on your feet, and then you transition to a wider format or larger format outside the shower. But that sort of grippiness factor is a big deal for aging in place, but also for everyone too, and we don't have to be anti-grout.
Taylor Davis (09:26):
No, actually there was a guy in New Jersey I think when we were there, who his whole business was dealing with people who hated grout and called himself The Grout Grouch, and I thought it was such a great name for a business. And so, he would come in and clean people's aging grout, but the grout grouch, I don't know where he is now, but he was a lot of fun.
Marilyn Moedinger (09:46):
He's probably retired and has three dogs-
Taylor Davis (09:48):
Probably. Probably.
Marilyn Moedinger (09:49):
Because that's a really good business (laughs).
Taylor Davis (09:50):
Yeah. It was a really good business (laughs).
Sheri Scott (09:52):
One thing we learned with a client a couple of years ago, maybe a few years ago, was that you can stain grout if you have older grout. Or what happened in our case, they wanted a very dark grout with this beautiful mint green handmade tile. It was just gorgeous, but the grout wasn't dark enough, and so they just came back and essentially painted a stain on there, which was great.
How do you guys deal with price? Can you give our listeners some idea of what's low, middle, high, where do you start?
Marilyn Moedinger (10:28):
So, price for me around tile is definitely calibrated to where you're putting it. So, don't just look at the per square foot cost and say, “Oh, my gosh, this is $150 a square foot,” which is quite expensive. But if it's a back splash in your bar, butler's pantry, or it's three-square feet, then it's fine. It doesn't matter as much.
Your shower surround, that's a lot of square footage. So, we want to be, let's pick something that's $10 to $15 a foot or $5 or whatever that's much less expensive. So, we calibrate the price; just don't go to the price right away.
Look at your square footage, amount of each kind of tile and you might be able to splurge in some ways that you couldn't even imagine that you could because it's actually not that much square footage. Kitchen backsplash is usually not a ton, so you can afford. So, that's how we have that conversation.
Taylor Davis (11:25):
And I think we always do a back pocket selection too. Like everybody wants to come in and have their gorgeous mosaic tile somewhere. If we can find something that somebody loves that maybe mimics that in a kind of textured or a pattern tile that's a bit larger format.
I mean, labor is a big part of tile. It's not just the material, it's how difficult is it to install and the quality of the floor and the quality of the structure, and the substrate all goes into all of that. So, you can get a cheap tile, and it can have a terrible installation at which point, you have to go back and redo it. So, I think labor is a big piece of that. I want to highlight that.
But having kind of back pocket selections is always really helpful. So, when we are going to a tile showroom, we may make our: like, this is the thing we love, this is what we've fallen in love with, and we love this too, and we know it's going to be half the material cost. And so, if something comes up as we're going through pricing, we can sort of revert back to that me like, “Hey, you all loved this too. This worked really well.”
Marilyn Moedinger (12:30):
Part two of that I think, and the labor side, is like you can pick the most cost-effective tile ever. Just a simple subway tile or whatever, and you can do something really special with it. A herring bone pattern or something really creative with a pattern that is a higher labor cost, but you're using a less costly material to start with. And so, maybe you still end up kind of ahead of the game than if you got the super fancy tile or something like that.
So, there's the tile itself, but then there's also layout, what is the pattern you're doing like a herringbone or a checkerboard, or a stack or an offset or a brick, or a semi offset, or whatever. And we actually (so here's my question for you guys) plan all that out and we draw that out in our drawings, like every single tile pattern. Do you guys do that?
Taylor Davis (13:16):
Yeah, we do.
Sheri Scott (13:18):
Depends on our client.
Marilyn Moedinger (13:19):
Sure. Yeah, that's a good point.
Taylor Davis (13:21):
Because we want to line things up too and we want to make sure that we don't have any slivers … I hate slivers, tile slivers make me crazy.
Marilyn Moedinger (13:31):
Yes, me too.
Taylor Davis (13:32):
And so, tile comes in all sorts of different sizes, so we want to lay it all out and minimize … in a renovation, you may not be able to escape slivers. But if we can, we want to. So, drawing all of that out is really important.
The other thing I'll add to sort of the like looking at lower cost tile and installing it in cool ways, don't sleep on what you think is commercial tile. Because a lot of times your architects will have access to commercial finishes and so sometimes, we can get really great tile that's commercially made or made for commercial installations. It's a little bit cheaper than what you would think residential, specific special residential tile is.
There are some really amazing options out there that you may go into a restaurant around the corner and see this brand-new bar installation, and you're like, “Hey, that's the tile I've got in my shower.” That's good too. So, don't sleep on some of those commercial tiles too.
Marilyn Moedinger (14:28):
I also want to put in some quick rapid fire, like do these things to make tile good. So, a couple of them: line up your niches with the grout lines. So, when you put a niche in your shower, line it up with the grout lines, do not offset it, you’ll look like you don’t know what you're doing, so that's one.
Another is do a dry lay. So, ask your tile setter, ask your general contractor who will ask your tile setter to do a dry lay on the floor of exactly how it's going to play out, especially for complicated things. If it's easy, you don't have to. But do a dry lay, find out what those issues are, resolve those so that you aren't resolving them in the tile that's stuck on the wall.
And then my third quick rapid-fire piece of advice is to think of the edges. So, it's fine, you've got the field, you've picked out your tile, you've picked out the pattern, you've lined up your ground lines, but don't forget the edge.
So, a lot of times we're using a piece of what's colloquially known as “schluter,” which Schluter is a company that has lots of products, but in tile world you always say, “What schluter do you want?” And it's a piece of metal edging that you can get to match the same colors or fixtures, which is what you should do by the way.
So, that piece of edging or you do a bull nose or you do a transition piece, but you have to think about those edges. If you're just thinking about the inside, you're missing a big part of the design.
Taylor Davis (15:51):
And I want to give a like 1A and 1B to your laying everything out and having the grout.
Marilyn Moedinger (15:57):
It’s getting complicated. I love it.
Taylor Davis (15:58):
We like to lay out the fixture, the fittings, the plumbing fittings so that they line up with the grout lines too. So that's a big call out on our drawings.
The other thing that you can ask your GC (general contractor) to do, you can lay it out on the floor, but we also, during framing, if we've selected the tile already, we get him to do a storyboard, which is just a big piece of lumber, and he can course out the tile on that board and mark it out so you can see exactly where the grout lines are going to go on the wall and you can “rough in” your plumbing.
You can also loop in plumbing so that you can adjust it if the tile hasn't been there. But thinking about how your tile and your plumbing fittings, your cabinetry, all that stuff is going to line up, will make that tile that you have selected sing.
Marilyn Moedinger (16:45):
Amen.
Taylor Davis (16:46):
It's not a pain in the rear kind of detail; it's actually something that enhances the selections that you've made and that you've fallen in love with.
Marilyn Moedinger (16:55):
Because you're going to see it every day. You're staring at it every day like it should be.
Taylor Davis (16:58):
Don't you all see those hotel TikToks where they show how the niche or something isn't lined up with a tile-
Sheri Scott (17:04):
Yes (laughs).
Taylor Davis (17:04):
And everybody goes bananas. Like it goes all over my Instagram and my TikTok feed.
Sheri Scott (17:08):
It's hilarious.
Taylor Davis (17:09):
I don't want to be that TikTok.
Marilyn Moedinger (17:10):
No, yeah.
Sheri Scott (17:12):
So, if people don't have an interior designer or architect that's following them through construction, who do you think they have that conversation with about tile layouts and at what point?
Marilyn Moedinger (17:25):
It’s the builder. It's got to be the builder.
Taylor Davis (17:26):
Builder.
Sheri Scott (17:27):
Yeah.
Marilyn Moedinger (17:27):
Or also, so my tile rep will do limited design services as well.
Sheri Scott (17:34):
Yeah, ours will too. That's right.
Marilyn Moedinger (17:35):
Yeah. So, if your tile rep offers that service, then that's really helpful because the builder has got a thousand things on their mind and will be very grateful for anyone to do that design work besides themselves. So, your tile rep, that'd be the next place I'd go.
Taylor Davis (17:53):
And I would ask your builder if you can see some tile installations from their tile sub(contractor) if you don't have a designer or an architect that's drawing that stuff out, because installation is such a critical piece of tile.
Sheri Scott (18:06):
It makes or breaks the tile and when it's your-
Taylor Davis (18:08):
Absolutely does.
Sheri Scott (18:09):
It's something you're in love with and then you walk in and something's not aligned or it's the wrong grout — there are just so many things that are heartbreaking with tile.
Taylor Davis (18:19):
And not every installer is skilled in the same installations, and there are different nuances to different kinds of tile and stone and all of those things. So, if you don't have an interior designer or architect, I would definitely ask to see some installations from the tile setter.
Marilyn Moedinger (18:37):
That's a great point. Feels like that's a good spot to end. But we're going to keep talking about tile; there's so much more to talk about. Attention everyone! There's more to talk about with tile. Don't worry. Stay tuned for future tile conversations.
Taylor Davis (18:50):
If your question was not answered, don't worry, we will for sure get back to it.
Marilyn Moedinger (18:55):
Or send us your question.
Taylor Davis (18:56):
The email address is in the show notes. Yes, do we have it in the show notes?
Marilyn Moedinger (19:01):
Yeah.
Taylor Davis (19:02):
The email address is, yeah, okay.
Thanks for joining us today on Home: The Second Story for our quick snack on tile. If you have questions for us or you're interested in being a guest, please reach out at admin@htsspodcast.com, and we will see you next time.
[Music Playing]
Voiceover (19:18):
Thanks for listening to Home: The Second Story Podcast. Feel free to share this episode with a friend. Contact information for all three of our architects are in our show notes, and don't miss future episodes. Follow or subscribe to our show for free in Apple, Spotify, YouTube, or wherever you're listening right now.