How to Lay Hex Floor Tiles

Installing hexagon-shaped ceramic or porcelain tiles can give an upscale appearance to a bathroom or kitchen floor. Because of their unique shape and small size, care must be taken to lay them correctly to create the desired effect.

Things You'll Need

• Plywood
• Hex tiles
• Straightedge
• Tile cutters
• Mortar
• Trowel
• Hammer
• Grout
• Towel

Instructions

1. Measure the room to be tiled. Purchase sufficient square footage of tiles to cover the space, plus 10 percent to 15 percent extra to allow for broken tiles and errors.

2. Nail down exterior-grade plywood over the existing floor. Leave a quarter-inch gap between the boards and the walls.

3. Lay tiles parallel against the longest wall of the room first. Do this first without mortar to get a sense of what the finished room will look like. Hex tiles are purchased in small sheets on a flexible rubber backing. Because of the interlocking tile design, the sheet edges are not straight, and thus will need to be measured and cut to line up with the walls. Measure the tiles with a straightedge and mark with a pencil, then cut tiles with tile cutters.

4. Mix up mortar according to the manufacturer's instructions. Dampen the floorboards. Spread a quarter-inch of mortar evenly over a small area using a trowel. Create a ridged surface on the mortar with the trowel to give the tiles something to cling to.

5. Lay the tiles down across the mortar. Cover the tiles with a piece of plywood, and hammer down lightly across the surface of the board to drive the tiles firmly and evenly into the mortar. Lay tiles over the entire room in this manner. Let the mortar set for at least 24 hours.

6. Spread grout over the surface of the tiles, working in small sections at a time. Work the grout into the edges between the tiles, then scrape away the excess with a trowel. Wipe off any remaining grout with a damp towel.

Tips & Warnings

• Hex tiles fit together in an interlocking pattern. While laying sheets of tiles next to each other, make sure the tiles lock together seamlessly so that it's impossible to tell the boundary between sheets. To tile around a small area, such as a floor drain, remove individual tiles from the sticky rubber backing and cut the backing to fit around the obstacle. Cut individual tiles to the proper size and reaffix them to the backing. Leave a quarter-inch of space between the borders of the tile sheets and the walls. This space will give the tiles room to expand naturally.

• Don't walk on a tile floor before the mortar has set. Mortar will squish up between the tiles, and the hexagonal pattern---and the appearance of your new floor---will be ruined.

References

• Build a Top-Notch Bathroom Floor
• Installing a Hex Tile Floor
• Cutting a Sheet of Mosaic Hex Tiles