One of life's hardest, if niche, questions: what colour grout to use? The internet has a mix of opinions though a prominent one is to only use white, a rule we applied in Bristol. More experienced and discerning than ever though, we opted for a slightly rogue option: jade. It's a creamy off-white. We did agree with the internet that the grout should be lighter than the stone to make it stand out but were keen to have something which already looked dirty. Lessons learnt and all that.
We chose the good stuff, the branded Mapei powder instead of the Screwfix own brand. It's twice the price and Lord knows what the difference actually is but if we've learnt one thing it's that quality will win out in most cases and it's often not worth the risk. And it was only about £14.
The first job was to seal all the stone. Natural stone is porous to some degree so needs to be impregnated with stuff to stop water, oil or grime getting in. We just used a paint on bottle of stuff and left it to dry overnight. This helps resist the grout later too.
Anyone who has asked about grouting will elicit the same response from these quarters: it's all about teetering on the cliff-edge of time. You mix up the powder and it starts setting. You start pushing it into the gaps as quickly as possible within the working time of the paste but wait! You've also got to go back and wipe the stuff you did fifteen minutes ago with a damp sponge. Yet you also need to keep using the batch you've just mixed up before it sets... Always use a helper. It's easier.
After the wiping you let it all dry out. Most importantly, don't be put off by the film of grout which develops on the tiles. This will just wipe off with a dry cloth afterwards. Not a wet cloth. This just smears it everywhere again. Dry cloth.
With all that done, that was the floor complete*. What did you do on the first day of the new year?
*Except for a tiny bit around the shower where we hadn't worked out how and where the drainage was actually going to fit in yet.