1939 "Minimal Traditional" Cottage

[awomanwithahammer]

Funny, but my house isn't yellow anymore. I repainted it, and I have a picture of it, but I can't figure out how to change the file size to make my avatar.

Here it is now:

Sorry to threadjack!

Bonnie, I resized it for you and the border color came from the flowers. If you hate the border color, tell me what you want instead and I'll redo it. You can find it in the District Album of the Gallery. If you like it as is, just click on it and save it so you can change from your current one. PM if you want the border color changed so we don't further threadjack.

Thank you, Lily! Looks great!

[GinaC]

I think I've finally figured out what to put down on the floor of the entire area that encompasses the back door entry, kitchen, and hallway connecting kitchen to bath to dining room. I can recreate the brick pattern on the living room hearth! I've requested a sample and they do custom colors.

https://www.inglenooktile.com/

Here's a photo that looks similar to what I have planned for my kitchen, but on my hearth is just a simple offset subway pattern. I think the brick would make a more pleasant transition from the wood floor in the common hallway areas. https://www.inglenooktile.com/uploads/1 ... g_orig.jpg

Has anyone here had any experience with this sort of tile? I'm hoping the durability will be comparable to porcelain tile.

[awomanwithahammer]

I have not had experience with it, but I would think it would be at least as durable as porcelain, and definitely more so than ceramic. Do you plan to seal it? If so, that will probably be the only maintenance on it. I think it sounds lovely.

[Lily left the valley]

What a wonderful idea, Gina.

I delved into their site a bit, and essentially what they do is make thinner variants of what one typically thinks of as a brick, hence the veneer label. They use the same materials one would use for brick, and fire them in the same manner as well. From the shop pictures I found, they seem about as thick or a bit more as average porcelain tiles.

So I agree with Bonnie. Once sealed, maintenance would be minimal.

[GinaC]

Annnnd... after more consideration, I'm not going to do that. I think it would look great if I wanted to replace the back porch steps with brick and add a patio -- but I really don't want to get into that.

The other thing is perhaps just a slate area in front of the back door, and install a wood floor in the kitchen and hallway to mimic the original. I haven't pulled up the sheet vinyl yet, but I remember the PO saying that he put the vinyl down because the kitchen floor was a mess.

The slate would coordinate with the slate around the fireplace, but all I can think of is my mother's 1970's slate entryway! Please tell me that slate entries were used before the 1970's!

[Lily left the valley]

The one thing I've heard about slate (and experienced in one short term rental that was a 60s split level with slate tiles at the front entryway) is it's more porous than other stone types, so maintenance can be slightly higher than other materials for a heavy traffic entryway by an outside door. Especially if you use salt for ice melting, I would think, as it would invariably be tracked indoors. I'm not sure about the non salt commercial melts and how they'd react to it.

I tried to do a quick search for period flooring for tudor cottages, since you've stated in the past that's the direction you want to go. One site stood out, as it shows a broad variety of possibles, even within the wood and stone variants. In case you may not have found this source yet yourself, here's the link: English Tudor, Tudor Cottage Interiors.

At least two I counted before scrolling down much seem to be a slate, with differing "block" sizes. Hope that helps ease your mind.

[GinaC]

Thank you so much for that link! That is extremely helpful.

The slate around the fireplace isn't in blocks, though, it's that 1970's "natural" shapes thing. At first I thought it was a later addition, but some small excavation reveals that it's original. I think they were going for an English cottage feel, but they just stuck some local slate pieces up. There are slate pieces stuck in the ground around the back door as well, and I've got one big slate rock sticking up in the back yard. Behind my house is a very steep slope, and the road that cuts through it has slate hills on both sides.



Now I'm back to wondering if it would indeed be worth it to go whole hog and replace the back steps with brick, make a little brick patio, and go with the brick kitchen/hallways as well.

Well, this does mean that I'll want to do the bathroom first so I have more time to chew on this.