If your walls are bare, your floors are feeling downtrodden, or your backsplash seems to flashback to another decade, a dash of designer tile might help you fall in love with your home again.
Rekindle the romance with top ideas from interior designer Megan Call of D'Mundo Tile. Call’s career started and flourished at her family’s business, and thanks to her design degree combined with her years of experience, she is fully equipped to guide clients through the process and find their dream match.
Already have tile that just isn’t working? “It can be messy to redo, but it's absolutely possible and well worth it,” says Call, who follows tile trends as a personal passion.
She’s in the right place. D'Mundo Tile represents more than 200 tile vendors, from Porcelanosa's groovy waves and Ann Sacks’ liquid-like metallic glass to pool-suitable Malibu revivals by Rendondo Tile, known for patterns that dip back into the early California style.
Get set to rethink your space with Call’s favorite tile trends:
Walker Zanger's textural Tilt collection comes in 3 white finishes.
Off the Wall
Walker Zanger takes the textured movement to new dimensions in their Tilt collection. The stoneware mosaics series nearly bounces off the wall with shapely shapes that span the gamut, from 1970s sci-fi to ’60s flower power. An all-white collection, Tilt comes in gloss, matte, and crackle finishes.
Tailored to perfection, Walker Zanger’s Sterling Row line includes menswear-inspired patterns that mix wood grain with marble. Clockwise from top left: Houndstooth, Chesterfield, Argyle, Buckle and Oxford.
Masculine Chic
The smartly tailored Sterling Row line by Walker Zanger gives a nod to sharp-dressed men, pairing the look of wood with marble in fashion-inspired patterns. “In a plain environment, they would be great as a statement wall or even for a foyer or lobby floor,” Call says.
Customize the colors of your chevron stripes in Oceanside’s Echo pattern.
Still Going Strong
Hotter than ever are casually modern chevron stripes (well shown in Oceanside’s Echo pattern) and Moroccan/Moorish patterns, which add a subtle note of the exotic in any room. Try Maniscalco’s Barossa Valley Crystal Glass tile for a dramatic crackled look in an arabesque pattern.
Nautilus tile from Walker Zanger’s Paradigm collection brings seaside elegance to a bathroom floor.
Mosaic Flooring
Tiny tiles underfoot are making a big comeback, says Call, who is particularly enamored with the swirling seaside pattern of Walker Zanger’s Nautilus tile from its Paradigm collection.
Metallic tile has been stealing hearts, between gold-leaf styles by Oceanside to pewter-brushed Byzantine tiles by Tabarka Studio, shown here in a backsplash.
Metallic Glamour
Clients have taken a shine to metals as of late, Call says. New lines feature soft gold and silver leafing over tile. The Byzantine collection by Tabarka Studio layers pewter or bronze on their custom terracotta tiles. Oceanside shows off gold and silver underneath glass in their Mesmerize blend, available in a number of patterns. Recently, Call used blocks of Oceanside’s antique mirror-style tile to create a shining backsplash behind a stove.
Worry-Free “Wood”
Liberating clients from fears of warping and scratching, porcelain tile that looks like wood is one of the largest industry trends in recent years. “Eleganza’s Nature series has the best gray I've seen so far,” says Call. “I also like the darker shades in their Woodland series. I've done a few showers in a wood look for urban style and even countertops for an unexpected barn-wood look.”
Moonstruck tile by Crossville is commercially rated and beautifully tough.
Commerical Tough
Crossville out of Tennessee is made in the USA and commercially rated for hard-use projects. The color goes all the way through each tile so an installer can create bullnose edges himself if desired.
Elysium Mosaics pairs glitter with stone.
True Sparklers
Begging to be installed in a dressing room vanity or to frame a mirror, Elysium Mosaics adds serious bling to simple patterns. Glittering gems are intermixed with sleek Carrara marble and glitter pairs up with toned-down stone.
La Palma, a sparsely mottled gray limestone tile by Ann Sacks, reveals tiny fossils in its surface.
Set in Stone
In the natural stone family, clean-looking limestone is having its moment, Call says. As an alternative to the ever-popular stacked stone, tile companies are mixing flat tiles with stacked-stone style textures for a 3-D look that is both clean and classy.
D’Mundo Tile, 41900 Corporate Way #200, Palm Desert, (760) 340-3154; dmundotile.com
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