Italian Glass Tile

With unearthed examples dating back to 3,000 B.C., tile is one of the oldest man-made surfaces, and no tile material has the luster and beauty of Italian glass tile. This style of glass tile is named for the method of manufacture where Italians the used semi-transparent type of glass. Once just an ornamental add-on for trim on kitchen backsplashes and bathroom shower walls, glass tile is moving out into the more traveled areas of the home for installing on walls, mirrors and flooring adornment.

Most glass tile is made into small squares for mosaic patterns. These designs are then made into tile rugs, where the glass squares are glued to are screen mats. Traditionally, these tile rugs were in bathrooms or commercial settings, and many homeowners used them as borders for larger tile. Now they are utilized more prolifically and some of the opaque and clear glass tile rugs are placed near windows so that the light can filter through to provide great effects.

Just because a product is made of glass, it doesn't mean that you can see through it or that it just looks like a flat soda pop bottle. Like ceramic tile there are six different ways to manufacture glass tiles and each method gives a dramatically different look:

• Smalti
• Fused
• Sintered
• Cast
• Etched
• Slumped

These types of Italian glass tile are usually for mosaics. Smalti is the Italian word for glass paste or glaze and defines the chemical make-up of the substance. Like other glass products, smalti is composed of mostly silica, but then melted with potassium chlorate or sodium. Metals are added for color. Fired at a high temperature they roll the substance into a pancake-type shape and then hand-cut into small tiles.

When a glass is called fused, it is usually window-type glass that is first cut into various shapes and then fired. They then color it for both looks to hide the matting supporting it in mosaic form or mortar to hold it in place. Fused tiles can colored at the base to give a translucent quality and then etched.

The sinter process begins with powered glass put into molds and then fired to melt the glass into shapes. Color is added to the powder before smelting or afterward during the cooling process. These tiles are uniform in color and design than are smalti tiles and usually come in one-inch × one-inch squares. However, they are available in larger units, up to three-inch × three-inch.

The method of cast tile is to put pieces of glass into a mold and then fire until the chunks melt together. The process gives a layered look but it can also have an effect like granite where some colored pieces are prominent. Recycled glass is popular for this method because the glass is previously colored. Terrazzo is a good example of this type of tile.

If you mark the translucent layer on the surface of a tile, you can get a wide variety of designs:

• Abrasion – Achieve this by cutting or scuffing with diamond points or sandblasters, or even laser cutting.
• Acid - Corrosive acids such as hydroflouric acid are carefully spotted on the surface just long enough to etch the design and are then washed off.
• Layer – Adding another surface can give it an opaque or cloudy look.

Italian glass tile is also becoming popular because more recycled glass is making its way into the molds. This green thinking is very appealing to homeowners and it has given glass tile a real boost in popularity.

There are three basic ways to make glass tiles:

This recycling method is very labor-intensive as the molten glass with color already added, is poured into a pancake on a metal table and then pressed with a cookie cutter-like form to create the squares. The base color of the tiles stays the same but no two pieces are alike.

The glass pieces are melted to 1400 degrees centigrade before pouring into the molds. The result is a uniform tile and the wastage is kept to a minimum.

Large tiles can be high-fired and then put on an anealing table that cools the glass slowly and makes them stronger.

So for a dazzling tile display in any room of the home get a blast from glass!

• Written by Kim Kinrade

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