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Green and Clean: Ecofriendly Bath Floors
Foot-massaging pebble tile, beautiful recycled glass and more can help make your bathroom beautiful and earth friendly
I co-own departure: architecture planning interiors in Portland, Oregon, where I design both new residences and remodels. With a focus on forward-thinking sustainable designs, my preferred palette includes natural materials, simplicity, and playful contrasts.
I co-own departure: architecture planning interiors in Portland, Oregon,... More »
Bath floors play host to splashed water, wet feet, potty spills and makeup marks, so durability and hygiene are essential. However, that doesn't mean you have to sacrifice on style. Maintain those paramount qualities and amplify your bathroom's look with these ecofriendly flooring choices.
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Concrete floors. The ultimate multitasker, concrete can act as both the finish material and structural floor. Simplifying a complex flooring system to a single material is smart, efficient and cost effective. Green your concrete with recycled aggregates such as glass, porcelain or coal fly ash (though skip the fly ash if coal isn't produced in your region, as the transportation energy negates any green cred).
This bath handsomely warms up concrete's cool vibe with a slatted wood floor overlay outside the shower.
This bath handsomely warms up concrete's cool vibe with a slatted wood floor overlay outside the shower.
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| Pebble tile floors. Smooth stones underfoot gently massage tired toes and lend a spalike quality to your bath. While most conventional pebble tiles are derived from mining stone, the folks at Modwalls have created a 100 percent recycled glass version of pebble tiles, called ModRocks, that lend the spa vibe without harming the environment. |
by FORMA Design
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Terrazzo floors. Seemingly indestructible, terrazzo gets high marks for durability and good looks. This material, made of chips of marble or granite set in concrete and polished, also can score high for sustainability if you use no- or low-VOC sealers and low-impact aggregates such as recycled glass. Although terrazzo can be pricey, a bathroom, with its relatively small footprint, can be a great place to splurge on this top-notch material.
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Linoleum floors. Linoleum is often confused with sheet vinyl, but the two have little in common. True linoleum is made of natural materials, including linseed oil, and is inherently antimicrobial — perfect for combating mold and mildew in the bathroom. To boot, linoleum is scratch resistant, fire resistant and water resistant, and has even been known to strengthen over time, earning the nickname “40-year floor.”
Linoleum is available in sheets, tiles or planks. If you're not creating a pattern with tiles as in this charming bathroom, I recommend using sheets, as you'll have fewer joints and fewer places for the floor to show its age. Make sure that any adhesives are free of solvents and labeled "no-VOC."
Linoleum is available in sheets, tiles or planks. If you're not creating a pattern with tiles as in this charming bathroom, I recommend using sheets, as you'll have fewer joints and fewer places for the floor to show its age. Make sure that any adhesives are free of solvents and labeled "no-VOC."
by Birdseye Design
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Recycled glass tile floors. Recycled glass tile, with its jewellike qualities and bevy of color options, makes greening your bath a breeze. Nearly all of Oceanside Glasstile's products contain recycled content, ranging from 30 to 97 percent of the tile's composition. This bath employs Oceanside's Tessera series in Spruce, which is 95 percent recycled glass.
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| Ceramic tile floors. Ann Sacks' Savoy series (one of its Eco-Thinking lines), is made from 21 percent post-industrial recycled content, including ceramic waste material from discarded clay and tableware pieces. The refined Savoy series is affordable and broad, plying you with all the field tiles and mosaics a bath could want. |
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| Cork floors. Cork touts a lot of green cred: It's a rapidly renewable and carefully protected resource. Every nine years, producers in Portugal and Spain strip the thin bark of cork trees into long, wide slabs, using care not to damage the tree. Wine corks are stamped out first, and the scraps are then ground and pressed to make flooring and bulletin boards, so that every bit harvested is used. Make your cork water resistant with a low- or no-VOC sealer. Modwalls has boosted cork's ecofriendly reputation with its charming CorkDotz Mosaic Penny Round, created from the cork stopper industry's by-product. More on cork flooring |
by Rauser Design
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Wood floors. Designers and architects are eschewing the notion that wood floors don't belong in the bath. Instead, wood flooring is extended throughout homes and into bathrooms like this one, lending a seamless look. When properly sealed (with no- or low-VOC sealers, please), wood floors in the bath need not present any added challenges.
Just remember that, ecologically speaking, wood can be the best or the worst of materials. It can be almost perfect when harvested sustainably. It's durable, it has a long life cycle and milling can be simple and requires little energy. However, wood that's not harvested sustainably can be environmentally destructive. When choosing wood floors, look for the following to ensure you're making the most sustainable choice:
10 Top Tips for Getting Bathroom Tile Right
Cork Flooring 101: Warm Up to a Natural Wonder
More guides to ecofriendly design
Just remember that, ecologically speaking, wood can be the best or the worst of materials. It can be almost perfect when harvested sustainably. It's durable, it has a long life cycle and milling can be simple and requires little energy. However, wood that's not harvested sustainably can be environmentally destructive. When choosing wood floors, look for the following to ensure you're making the most sustainable choice:
- FSC-certified: The Forest Stewardship Council (FSC) is an independent agency that provides certification, or approval, to wood that's been harvested in a responsible manner. Think of it as wood's equivalent of organic.
- Local species: Wood harvested locally minimizes transportation-related energy, supports the local economy and reinforces the sense of place.
- Salvaged: The only thing better than recycling is upcycling, or repurposing salvaged materials. Doing so sets the bar high for sustainability and is an opportunity to bring some history and personality to your kitchen. Salvaged beams from a 100-year-old warehouse roof were milled into tongue and groove flooring for this home.
10 Top Tips for Getting Bathroom Tile Right
Cork Flooring 101: Warm Up to a Natural Wonder
More guides to ecofriendly design
Ideabook published on Aug. 6, 2012.
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Outside the shower is considered a none wet zone for the most part. Inside your shower is another story.
When selecting your tile ensure that the mesh backer does not cover more than 5% of the tile back. You will sadly find that most mosaic manufactures not complying with this rule. It is very hard to find proper tile for a shower floor.
The best mosaics come with a film face or paper face so that 100% coverage can be achieved.
Good luck with your search.
Using Green Building Products is very nice for the environment - but if they are installed poorly and need to be replaced in 2 years.... how green is that?
Not so much.
If you have a tile you love and you plan on skipping this TCNA 95% coverage rule at the very least soak the tile in water. What happens? Do the tiles fall off the sheets? If so does that make you feel comfortable about using them in a shower?
What does the glue smell like? Many of the glues used in applying tile to sheets is water based. The tile manufacture over seas. India. China. Two huge exporters of mosaic tile. What is the water quality there? I find that many of these sheets smell like _____ once wet. Not what I want in my shower or any of my clients.
Do your homework. Ask the right questions and soak test your tile choice. Simple steps to build green and not risk your renovation being re-done.
JW
Many pools are tiled with glass mosaic and they last. These tiles are so called "submerged" and nothing happens. It shows perfect, when glass mosaic is installed properly (proper surface preparation + proper setting material, proper grout, etc.) is not a problem at all. It is not about the glass tiles itself, it's all about how the glass mosaic sheets are produced. Jon mentioned this already in his statement.
About recycled glass tiles: I advocate green products however when I should pay double or even triple the price for recycled glass tiles than for regular glass tiles, then it looks to me it's fraud. Why are this glass tiles more expensive than regular glass tiles ??? They are actually produced from "garbage" with less energy effort in the production process. It's the same fraud like the fraud with the BIO grocery products. With "BIO" and "GREEN" many clever businessmen make a lot of money.
" Also, thinking down the road when glass tiles are no longer in style, scraping them up could be a dangerous proposition."
If tiles are installed properly you can't scrape them off anymore without destroying the substrate. No mater what kind of tiles were installed. !!!
So if glass tiles are not longer in style, you can either (presupposed the tiles are properly installed) over tile it:
Project: Bathroom Remodeling in 1998 - Tiling over Existing Tiles - Location Germany
Or you have to rip off the whole tile backer incl. the glass tiles. This should be actually the scenario for all tiled walls !!! Unfortunately this is NOT the case. Everytime when you can scrape the tiles from a wall without destroying the tile backer, these tiles weren't installed properly! Without two exceptions. First: The substrate is concrete. Second the substrate is covered by a liquid ore a sheet waterprofing membrane.
Please have also a look at this article for more information about proper tile installation.
Ideabook: How to Choose Tile for a Bathtub
One important point for a proper tile installation is the coverage of the tile. But this is just one point. There are many more.
Regards,
3D-Tile-Design - Bertram Tasch
Maple Ridge, BC (Greater Vancouver)
http://www.3D-Tile-Design.ca
Regards,
3D-Tile-Design - Bertram Tasch
Maple Ridge, BC (Greater Vancouver)
http://www.3D-Tile-Design.ca
Ensuring it can be installed properly and that it will last for generations is also a Green Building Practice.
Building with some low end product and saving maybe $400.00 - $3,000.00 in the total job is not green if the entire shower fails because the mesh sheet is not designed for wet locations. Not all are - It's rare to find a low end sheet tile or mosaic that has the glass or tile attached properly.
Paper faced or film faced products are best.
Most times you get what you pay for.
JW
You are also right with your statement: "Most times you get what you pay for." However often you pay more as you get!
"It's rare to find a low end sheet tile or mosaic that has the glass or tile attached properly." This is also true. But this doesn't mean in reverse, expensive mosaic/tiles are automatically good!
Therefore I offer to my clients always accompanying them while shopping tiles to advise them which tiles are possible/suitable and which are not to avoid further problems.
Regards,
3D-Tile-Design - Bertram Tasch
Maple Ridge, BC (Greater Vancouver)
http://www.3D-Tile-Design.ca
When grouted (and may we suggest another awesome recycled product by Bostik called StarGlass/ Dimension Grout - see our blog all about it here: http://designernotes.modwalls.com/2012/05/30/did-you-know-that-all-grouts-are-not-created-equal/), the pebbles are no more difficult to clean than tile - and it's definitely easier to clean than natural stone since it's non-porous.
modwalls.com offers discounts to the trade as well as free samples. I recommend getting a sample of this and the CorkDotz to see the quality in person. If you still have questions, feel free to give me call or send me an email directly.
Best regards,
Katelyn Bowman
Trade Sales + Interior Design Specialist for modwalls
877-439-9734
katelyn@modwalls.com
I read your blog at: http://designernotes.modwalls.com/2012/05/30/did-you-know-that-all-grouts-are-not-created-equal/ and I have to say something regarding your article.
First: The two compared pictures are not really comparable because the right picture with the the sanded grout application is not sharp! It is pretty fuzzy. You should change the picture otherwise it looks like you are trying to "cheat". http://modwallsdesignernotes.files.wordpress.com/2012/05/starglass-vs-sanded-grout.jpg
Second: Glass tiles should never ever be grouted with sanded grout! The sand in the grout just acts like sandpaper / emery paper and makes the glass surface dull. And some glass tiles and especially coded molding/border tiles like gold borders are very very very sensitive against scratches! So you have to be very carefully when you are grouting such tiles!
In some cases I even use masking tape to protect the tile/border surface during the grouting process.
Sanded grout is intended for wider joints bigger than 1/8 (which is the case with pebbles) to prevent the joints from cracking. So you can obviously see the dilemma with glass pebbles and sanded grout.
I know about the StarGlass grout and I was holding the samples already in my hand, however I didn't have a chance jet to use it on a job site. So I can't tell how it is to work with it. It is also pretty expensive, therefore I didn't buy it just to try it out on a sample wall. But maybe I should, to see how it acts and how to work with.
Regards,
3D-Tile-Design - Bertram Tasch
Maple Ridge, BC (Greater Vancouver)
http://www.3D-Tile-Design.ca
Cheers Bertram