42m2+/ 439 sq ft antique Belgian Chimay floor with original borders

Unusual to reclaim a floor of this size, a now restored and arriving ready to relay antique ceramic floor of 14.5cm square tiles.

While the main field tiles clearly have Art Deco DNA in their design, the floor was actually produced much earlier, having been manufactured just before WWI in Chimay, Belgium.

The floor totals some 42.5m2+ / 457 sq ft+ including 12 large border corners reclaimed.

The floor has an appealing antique patina, there are small chips evident on some tiles and all groutable and there are some tiles bearing capillary cracks, formed when the tiles left the kiln and were cooling. Again, all groutable, as they were when the floor was originally laid over 100 years ago.

The photographs are of a random selection of the floor, some 1.5m2 / 16 sq ft.

A highly fired tile, it can be laid inside or outside of the home.

Tiles quantities by tile type:-

FIELD TILES - 1,765 - 37m2 / 399 sq ft.

LARGE BORDERS - 240 plus 12 corners - 5.3m2 / 57 sq ft. or 36.5 linear metres / 120 linear ft. 

NOTE
Antique tiles were most commonly made in single or two tile moulds. Before current computer automation methods their moulds were made my hand and the colour slips mixed by eye. Kiln temperatures could also be variable, as could the firing time. The result is that often tiles display subtle size and thickness variations and there can be tonal variations in colours, owing to the slip mixing and/or firing time. All of this makes these handmade tiles unique and adds to their charm. Some floors display their subtle variations in size and tones, some not, but when photographing we always take a random section of the floor so that it is representative of the whole. A tiler should always dry lay a section of the tiles to familiarise himself with them before starting to fix lay.