Monday, 30 January 2017

How I grout a rainbow mosaic house number with sunflower motif!

Hello blogger friends,

I often get asked how I grout my mosaics. I must say from the beginning that no one has ever taught me - this is the just the way I do it, and it is seems to work pretty well, so this is for all you budding mosaicists out there!


Having made the mosaic and all the tiles are thoroughly stuck and are where I want them,  I get the Unibond grout  www.diy.com, plastic jug www.asda.com and spatula www.amazon.co.uk

 
I measure three serving spoons worth of the powder grout (about the right amount for this 20cm x 20cm mosaic), and mix in small amounts of water until I have a buttercream consistency, the same as in the middle of a cake, mixing it together with the spatula. Make sure you don't get a dry lump of grout at the bottom of the jug!

Next, be brave and get spreading! I work the grout firmly into all the spaces between the tiles.

I keep going over the mosaic, spreading the grout on thickly, and then scraping it off with the soft edged spatula, again and again.

The edges are very important in mosaics - especially for this exterior house number - as that is the place where water might get in. I use my index finger to press the grout right into the edge, going round and round the edges until I am sure it is all completely covered. - be careful for sharp edged tiles!

I wipe all the excess grout off, checking once again that there are no gaps - it's amazing how grout sinks and suddenly a hole appears from nowhere!

Before the final wipe, I use a thin and sharp tool to make the holes either side for fixing, before the grout dries.  I paint the sides and back in an exterior paint to finish it off. The mosaic is then ready to go up, and lift your spirits every time you go into your place for years to come 😀
If you have any questions about making mosaics, or a project you are working on, do leave me a comment and I will do my best to answer it for you.

Thanks so much for reading, and look forward to hearing from you.
Felicity x
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5 comments:

  1. Anonymous30 January 2017 at 20:32

    Hi felicity, can you tell me of some good tile cutters please

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  2. Felicity Ball mosaics30 January 2017 at 20:41

    Hi there - I use the ones from www.hobbycraft.co.uk with the red handles - they are about £15 and lasted me for years!
    Fx

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  3. Unknown6 February 2017 at 20:19

    Hi Felicity

    I;m going to have a go at the sunny number mosaic for our house but am not sure what to use for backing/ to glue the mosaics on to? Also if I wanted to do something similar for indoors what backings do you use?? Thanks Melanie x

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    Replies
    1. Felicity Ball mosaics6 February 2017 at 20:44

      Hi Melanie - for exterior mosaics I use cement board and for interior mosaics I use marine plywood - I get both at B and Q - good luck! Fx

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  4. Unknown8 January 2019 at 17:15

    Hi Felicity,
    I’m very happy to find your blog. Thank you for sharing advices of how to make mosaics. Your posts are easy and interesting to read. I’m a beginner in mosaics and feel very inspired to create many things. I’d like to ask you if you use some kind of board as a temporary base with moving frame (for different sizes of mosaics) in order to make the edges of mosaic exact straight and even? How do you manage to lay the tiles so even along the edges? Is it just a matter of experience or you have some facilities for making it so straight?
    Thank you in advance.
    Kind regards, Anna

    ReplyDelete