Hi to USA & Canada.
Just out of interest apart from the mosaic floors in hex & oct do any of you restore the original Victorian Floors?

Just wondering as there are millions of square yards of these tiles in both countries.

If anyone is interested get in touch ?

Check out my albums on the forum to see what i'm talking about and website www.heritagetiling.com

be interested in feedback Cheers

Hi Steve, Sadly, all too often these kinds of floors get torn out and go into the dumpster. We are doing a job in Washington DC right now, and the house two doors down (circa 1900) has been gutted. The original bathroom-gone to the dumpster. The original kitchen floor-gone. The original entryway-gone. Eight fireplace surrounds and hearths--all gone.

One of my men got into the house and took pictures before they did the demo. I'll see if I can get them and will post them here.

Thanks Rob, i guessed it would be like that, it was the same here in the 1970's and in some places it still happens, normally if it is listed ( do you have the same listings ?) the floor gets either covered up or if it is simple repairs someone will have a go at fixing it but lot's of floors still get butchered or ruined here.

I reckon if organisations & people were made properly aware of the fact that thses floors can be restored it would be possible for thousands of tilers to earn their living doing nothing elsebut restoration.

Just in Washington there are over 2.6 million sq metres of Encaustic & Geometric tiling. so if all the Victorian type houses with tiles are taken into account worldwide there would be billions of tiles planetwide.

Here in the UK there is supposed to be a Heritage program being organised but so far the only ones getting anything out of it are penpushers.

I was told awhile back that i had a traditional skill that is pure BS, it is not traditional to pull a floor up and put it back so it looks like it was never damaged.

It is a new skill that has come about because of need, it is not like lime plastering or rendering ot thatching or smithing etc which are traditional skills.
It just looks traditional when you have finished.
we need to organise worldwide training and save these floors before they all end up in a skip.

Well said Steve.
I had a guy on the phone to me 2 days ago from Budapest, he was contracts manager over the airport refurbishments.
Cleaning and repair work plus thousands of metres of granite floors and marble walls.
Obviously the tenders for this finishing work were in and he was just running prices past me.
He comes from Ireland here and got my number from a tile shop locally.
I mentioned you etc and that specialised companies were about.
I'm on a break here on my phone and need to run.
I'm also trying to get a price on 450x450 polished granite for him.

Hi Joe, I'm catching up on expanding database,being honest i wouldn't want to get into large scale projects like that mentioned. over 20 years ago i used to have a commercial operation as well , we used to work for Rank did motorways services MOD work etc etc. but it ended up with me flying around like a blue a**ed fly.
However restoration work is something i really enjoy and getting problems solved and turning floors that have collasped into a cellar back into a proper floor again is satisfying.

I am going to really hammer away this year at the various authorities & heritage organisations and see if we can get something done not just lipservice and run by skilled crafts for people who want to learn rather than just add to the mountain of admin bumf that pours out of these quango's.

Might be a pipe dream but i'm going to have a go, never know we might even succeed.
good luck with biz.

Hi There Steve, yes, we have something here called The National Register of Historical Places. There are other organizations, and some which somehow legally restrict what property owners can do with their own property. Here is a basic bit of info on the NRHP.

National Register of Historic Places - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Originally Posted by Tenchman

Thanks Rob, i guessed it would be like that, it was the same here in the 1970's and in some places it still happens, normally if it is listed ( do you have the same listings ?) the floor gets either covered up or if it is simple repairs someone will have a go at fixing it but lot's of floors still get butchered or ruined here.

I reckon if organisations & people were made properly aware of the fact that thses floors can be restored it would be possible for thousands of tilers to earn their living doing nothing elsebut restoration.

Just in Washington there are over 2.6 million sq metres of Encaustic & Geometric tiling. so if all the Victorian type houses with tiles are taken into account worldwide there would be billions of tiles planetwide.

Here in the UK there is supposed to be a Heritage program being organised but so far the only ones getting anything out of it are penpushers.

I was told awhile back that i had a traditional skill that is pure BS, it is not traditional to pull a floor up and put it back so it looks like it was never damaged.

It is a new skill that has come about because of need, it is not like lime plastering or rendering ot thatching or smithing etc which are traditional skills.
It just looks traditional when you have finished.
we need to organise worldwide training and save these floors before they all end up in a skip.

Steve, I just thought of this...A National Historic Landmark might be similar to your "listings" in the UK.

National Historic Landmark - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

I don't see any of it out here. But still being installed in US. This installer is in upstate New York. Click the link and scroll halfway down the page.
Pic of your craziest custom tile design? - Page 288 - Ceramic Tile Advice Forums - John Bridge Ceramic Tile

here in stoke-on-trent there are many old blocks of terrece houses been knocked down, i drive past them every day, you can see the tiles on the entrance walls and floors. all the houses were originaly tilied in Campbell Brick & Tile Co.tiles, who were orginal know as Minton. I have contacted the local council to see if I can reclaim these tiles, but I have had no luck.

I have managed to relaim a few floors from friends houses. Cleaned them and the sold them. I love working with old tiles, I am from stoke and it breaks my heart when I see all these works of art been thrown in to skips. I would like to save them all. There is a big market out there for complete, reclaimed floors and walls.

When reclaiming floors you can see where the orginal tiler has made a few tweaks and taken a few mm off tiles to make them fit. as a tile fixer i find it very interesting discover these things, these guys were master crafts men, which is what I am aiming for.

Blimey Rob, looked up that info, given the size of the States,it lists less than 3,000 on that register! perhaps thers is a conservation area listing as well? doesn't bode well for Victorian floors that need fixing as it appears from what you said they get skipped.

Borgie try the demolition co's the local council will have given them the contracts so the council won't have any say in the matter.

the houses you are talking about won't be listed so all tiles etc just end up as landfill etc.

There is a very limited market in actual fact for whole floors etc as the tiles have to be cleaned sides & back before they are fitted the floor thay are going into may be bigger or smaller if you havn't extras in same tiles you are snookered.

Thier are site's selling these floors and tiles but you need to know how to put them down and there is a lot of invisible work before you get to a finished floor.

i get people offereing floors to me at incredible prices as they have checked with a co to see how much a new floor would be.

New floors are easier to fit, no cleaning or resizing.

but i would try the demolition co's if you offer to lift the floor before they start you might get them cheap bearing in mind some will break on lifting.
Cheers Steve

Originally Posted by Homza

I don't see any of it out here. But still being installed in US. This installer is in upstate New York. Click the link and scroll halfway down the page.
Pic of your craziest custom tile design? - Page 288 - Ceramic Tile Advice Forums - John Bridge Ceramic Tile

took a look at that job , it is close to what i do but only on a small scale. looking for tilers over there who either are interested in being trained or who carry out Geometric tiling or restoration. I'd like to compare notes or offer training.
Also would like to find out if Victorian tiled floors are all over the USA or just in small pockets ?
Cheers Steve

Steve, ironically I think it is concentrated in the original 13 colonies more specifically older homes from Washington DC to Boston. I used to be in NYC and did see some installations but most was smaller projects like fireplaces.

You do nice work.

Hi there Steve, as Isaac said, you would find a lot of these floors and fireplaces in the original 13 colonies, and in older metropolitan areas such as Chicago, etc. I read an article one time that analyzed what tilework cost "way back when", and it was really, really expensive (particularly for the material). And so we see these kinds of installations in houses that were built for the wealthy.

Hi Rob, What's the 13 colonies ? It would be expensive as the tiles would be made in
the Stoke-on-Trent area known as the " Potteries" then transported from there to Liverpool shipped from there to New York and then wherever, i'd assume New York and the nearer cities have the most Victorian tile floors as they would be nearest to the shipped point.
some of the tilers sent over to fix these tiles stayed, so i guess some of their descendants are living near the places most of the tiles were fixed.

You could hunt them down ha ha

ive just found this convo and found it very interesting.. i recon the US could do with our expertise Trenchman.. i did get a phone call from a David Malkin from the states asking me what i did and he was very keen.. maybe its time to revive this...
btw fantastic work fella..

Doing a collaboration with atop tiler in San Francisco at the moment getting tiles made here by Craven andsupplying a lot of original Victorian geometric tiles for a Victorian encaustic& geometric floor that the US guys lifted some 18 years a go going to beput back together this year sadly I’m just supplying tiles & know how but I’mgoing to keep plugging away until they realise these tiles should be saved notskipped.
thanks for the comment on my work. got a new website coming out soon will be much better cheers Steve

I just saw this thread. Most of the older (older to us) victorian homes are in the mill towns who many have fallen into disrepair by hard times in manufacturing. Some of these homes fell into such disrepair that they are having to be torn down or gutted completely. Usually if the mortar bed is not supported properly anymore and the tiles have broken badly.

I do believe that if we had the skillset and mindset most could be saved. Being in the stone restoration industry I would love to learn about repairing old tiles but many people have a disposable attitude which is nearly impossible to change. I get customers who have only 15 year old granite countertops (workbench to you) taken out instead of repairing them - just try to tell them to restore something as small as a tile.

that is a shame Topshop..so much beauty lost..im sure if you need advice you can find the answer on the forum.if i can help dont hesitate .kev