Bathroom tile in New Jersey — floors, showers, niches and feature walls, chosen with the vanity

Floor, shower, wall

• Floors. Large-format porcelain (12×24, 24×24, 24×48) in stone and concrete looks for fewer grout lines; marble-look porcelain for the marble floor without the sealing; a mosaic — hex, penny, basketweave — for a period bath. The South Orange baths run a marble-pattern tile floor under a walnut vanity.
• Showers. The floor tile run up the walls for one material, or marble and zellige for the feature; a 2×2 or hex mosaic on the shower floor for grip; a bench and a niche in a slab or an accent tile — the marble-tiled shower with a bench in the Room Therapy bath.
• Feature walls. A vertical-stack tile, a zellige in colour, a fluted or 3D porcelain behind the vanity — the teal tile behind the walnut slat vanity at the lake house, the green bath.
• Powder rooms. The place for the bold tile — patterned cement looks, dark zellige, marble mosaics — in a room used for minutes.

Five partners for the bath

MSI for porcelain floors and shower systems from Edison; Eco Tile Imports for European large-format porcelain and white marbles; Roca for marble and stone looks, zellige and 3D wall textures; Otto Tile for Carrara, Calacatta, Thassos and water-jet mosaics; SOHO Studio for designer collections in ceramic, marble, glass and terrazzo. Boards for all five are in the showrooms.

Chosen with the vanity

The vanity width sets the mirror, the tile sets the grout and the trim, the top sets the faucet — so we lay it out together: the vanity and its finish, the top, the floor tile, the shower tile, the mosaic, the niche, the grout colour and the trim, on one estimate with installation. Floating vanities get their wall blocking while the wall is open; curbless showers are drawn where the floor allows. See bathroom remodeling for how the whole bath runs.