Calculating Tiles for your Bathroom Wall
- Before you calculate the number of tiles you need to tile your bathroom, you need to set it out correctly to ensure that it not only looks amazing, but also that you will not create problems for yourself like leaks.
- Start setting out by working out where to start vertically, you do this by drawing a level line of all the obstacles in the room eg: the top of door frame, window cill and head of window, the height of bath or shower tray etc, then draw a level line from all these points to meet one vertical line that is easy for you to work from. Because a bathroom normally has so many things to consider it is well worth spending more time getting this part right, so you know what size cuts that you will end up with at all points in the bathroom before you even start tiling.
- Lay a line of your tiles on the floor using the correct tile spacers, this will give you something to visualise how your cuts will work out by measuring your line of tiles then placing your measure against the vertical line of marks that you have drawn on the wall.
- You may find a good place to start tiling is from the bath or shower tray if it is level, or at least a large cut if it doesn’t work well for the other cuts. Always have as large a cut or whole tile if possible against wet areas like baths or showers, because a small cut of tile only has a small amount of adhesive to hold it in place, so could cause problems like leaks
- For example if you think the bath is level and would be a good place to start, measure up and down from the bath height on your vertical line that you have marked on the wall to see where each tile falls in relation to all the other level marks avoiding small tile cuts as much as possible, remember to include the floor and ceiling, assuming that you have checked how level they are.
- Once you have determined the right place to start, you can then draw a level line all around the room ensuring the line meets at the other side
- Now you can calculate the number of tiles required using the same method as floor tiles, measure the height of the wall and divide by the height of the tile, then round it up to the next whole tile, then the width of the wall divided by the width of the tile, again rounded up to a whole tile, then multiply the two together to figure out how many tiles you need for that one wall.
- Do the same for each wall individually, then add them all together at the end.
For a wall with a door in it, break this down to separate pieces, to the left of the door, to the right, and above the door. For a window wall, depending on window size and depth of the reveals/ window cill etc, think of this as a the lid of a cardboard box folded inwards, if you were to unfold them, you would cover most of the hole, so best to measure the complete wall.
