Tile, (Counter) Tops, and Tight Fits

The work on the interior “fittings,” if you will, of the house is now underway in earnest. With the cabinets installed in the pantry, kitchen, and bathrooms, one of the next steps is to “template” the counter tops. “Templating” means getting their exact–and I do mean exact–measurements. As George, the installer said, if they get them just wrong, a thousand-dollar slab of granite is ruined and his company ends up doing the job “for free.” Well, not free, exactly, but they don’t make any money on it. This is definitely a “measure twice (or three or four times, cut once” kind of job.

So with interior designer Edith supervising…

…and George measuring down to the 32nd of an inch…

…I was, um, supervising. Yeah, supervising! That’s it! (OK, and taking pictures. And making “do this/do that” decisions when necessary.)

This week I’ll be heading down to the two suppliers of the granite slabs we’ll be using to select new ones, since the ones we’d selected originally have been sold.

The kitchen and pantry will be a bit different, since the material we’ll be using there–a combination of crushed white quartz, recycled clear, gray, and blue glass pieces, and binder that goes by the brand name Curava ® Arctic Blue–will be molded based on the templating George did. Still, it’s just as critical to get those dimensions right. Edith brought along the different kinds of tile that are going to go on the kitchen walls so we could see them in place for the first time. That’s a piece of the Curava in front of the others.

The photo doesn’t give any sense at all of what the walls will look like, other than how the colors will work together. Stay tuned for further developments!

While we’re on the topic of colors and tiles, this was the first time Edith and I had a chance to see what some of the accent tile in the guest bath was going to look like when paired with the dark green cabinets there.

It’ll be easier to get a sense of how it all fits together once the counter top and other wall tile go in, but we both think those grays and browns are going to work well with the cabinets.

This is all pretty exciting–OK, it’s exciting to me–but another big step forward this week was the laying of the first tile on the floor, specifically the floor of what will be the “Oriental” bedroom. Tile-setter Kurtis is the best in the business in the area, and here he is at work.

OK, it wasn’t exactly the same kind of “magic moment” that The Drifters were singing about in the background, but it’s a pretty big deal anyway.

And speaking of big, the bookcase cabinets are going in in the office.

That trim piece around them needs to be just right, and of course the walls aren’t perfectly straight, so whenever the frame is just a little bit off…

like it is at the upper left corner, the guys have to take it out onto the patio, trim it a little, bring it back in, check to see if that was enough, and if not, do it again. No problem, right? Well, it just barely fits through the door onto the patio.

Part of the credenza/bookcase that will be behind my desk is in, too.

But there are more cabinets to go in.

Part of the cabinetry for the great room entertainment center is in as well.

So now, more and more, the interior is beginning to fill in and become something more than just open spaces.

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