The Turco Kitchen (Part 1)
Kristine and Michael Turco took the plunge and reinvigorated a tired old kitchen. The cabinets of the original kitchen were the only products that we kept in this reinvigoration. Our challenge for this project was to remove all the counter tops, base cabinets, wall trim (base and quarter-round), appliances (fridge, washer, dryer, stove, dishwasher), and a commode in the powder room off the kitchen. From there we tackled removing wall-to-wall full-spread sheet vinyl, and luan underlayment, with its thousands of staples, from the kitchen, powder, and laundry room floors.
Next, we installed Schluter Ditra uncoupling membrane over the 15/16” plywood subfloor. We installed it with a latex-modified thin-set mortar, and skimmed the entire surface of the Ditra with unmodified thin-set mortar to fill the cutback cavities of the Ditra and to make snapping chalk lines easier.
We installed a large format porcelain tile. 18”x36” through-body porcelain in a running bond pattern, with alternating polished and unpolished finishes in the row. Light streaming in from the windows plays across the staggered finishes creating contrast and reflections.
Installing over the Ditra was a challenge, primarily because the tile size required a medium bed mortar to support the weight of the tile and resist shrinking like most thin-set tends to do as they cure. Mortar that has shrunk when cured can cause unevenness in the edges of the tile, or lippage. Although the tile is a large format, through-body porcelain, we opted to stay with an unmodified thin-set for its installation, rather than a modified medium-bed mortar. Sandwiching a modified mortar in between a plastic uncoupling membrane and an impervious tile slows the drying time (coalescence) of the mortar because there is no air to allow the mortar to set. Unmodified thin-set, however, cures (or hydrates) without the need for air to harden.
We ended up combing the thin-set on the floor in one direction, and, back buttering the tiles and combing the thin-set in the opposite direction as the floor. This method gave us enough mortar beneath the tile ensuring 100% coverage of the mortar, and adequate mortar so that we could level the tiles to one another.
We then reset the cabinets after grouting beneath them. Since we were still expecting more foot traffic from other trades, we held off grouting the entire project.
The Turco Kitchen (Part 2)
During the installation, it was decided that the rear wall between the kitchen and the sunroom would be taken down and the sunroom enclosed, becoming part of the kitchen space. It's the wall with the french-doors in the photo below.
The challenge here became installing the kitchen floor tile enough and then transitioning from the kitchen elevation to the sunrooms lower elevation. Also, to further compound the difficulty, the sunroom floor was once an open porch, with a steep pitch to all four corners of the room to facilitate drainage.
This forced us to come up with a solution to compansate for the huge hump in the floor. Our options were limited. We couldn't grind the floor level without destroying the home with dust. We couldn't raise the level or flaten the slab with mud or compounds because of exterior door clearance issues.
So, what we did was design a pattern, a compass, that we installed in the center of the room which allowed us to "roll" with the humping contours of the slab. The pattern worked well to hide and deminish the defect, that we wouldn't have been able hide with a full tile layout.
The feild tile for the sunroom was 18"x18" unpolished porcelain, and we alternated polished and unpolished tile for the rays of the compass. As a finishing touch, we set a silver dollar in the center with the eyes of the engraving looking north.
The Turco Kitchen (Part 3)
The last part of the Turco kitchen was install the backsplash. First we installed under-the-cabinet lighting in the form of halogen puck lights. We also removed the existing wooden window sill and replaced it with a piece or stone that matched the counter tops. The tile was a 3"x3" mesh mounted, unpolished version of the floor tile.
Lastly, we grouted the entire job with Laticrete Sprectralock Epoxy grout. Because Mrs. Turco is a baker, and uses her kitchen a lot, an epoxy grout will make sure the grout looks great for years to come.