Handcrafted Tiles For Kitchen – Gothic Tile

Now don’t let the name fool you.  These tiles aren’t dark, scary or otherwise gloomy.  Gothic Tile Owner/Artist Barbara Vanderbilt does have a penchant for dragons though.

Via Gothic Tile

Details, details, details, these are what make a house a home.   Handcrafted tile has a place in most any home.  Regardless of a home’s “style”, tile can be used in various locations beyond a kitchen or bath.  Anyone can slap up a few subway tiles from Home Depot and call it wonderful.  But it is the care taken in finding a really spectacular tile option especially for a focal point of a kitchen backsplash, which makes a space special.   Gothic Tile is a small company who takes the care and effort to execute beautiful handcrafted tiles which could be fun in any home.

I met Barbara and her husband the other day at the Stoneworks tile showroom.  They have a wonderful studio in Whitefield, Maine where Barbara handcrafts these unbelievable tiles.  She creates tiles for kitchens, baths, pools, fireplaces, walls and fountains.  It might be more correct to say Barbara is an artist and we are lucky her medium happens to be tile so it can be easily incorporated into the interior design of a room.  Permanent art, I love it.

Via Gothic Tile

Barbara explained to me just how she creates her artwork (tiles).  She will often make the entire unit as one whole piece before carefully slicing it into individual tiles.  This allows her to make the cuts where they least interfere with the final design.  Her work is about the tile not the grout lines.  She will also cut pieces so they tuck over and under one another which enhances the integrity of the design and makes for a virtually seamless fit.

Notice how you barely see a cut line in the face tile?  She also custom makes all her molding whether to match an existing piece of wood molding or just as needed edge.  I love that all her corners are made/bent on this gothic arch with dragon face tiles.  No miters, cuts or sharp edges.  This the attention to detail which makes a customer feel they get what they pay for.

She has a wonderful palette of earth tones as well as a pretty eggplant, lime green and a few nice blues.  Of course she will custom make and glaze, “Not pink, I can’t get pink.”  She works color in as needed for fabulous murals or simple tiles.

Including the Lewis Carrol quote, “In Summer, when the days are long, perhaps you’ll understand the song.”

Via Gothic Tile

Barbara is happy to work with her customer with as little or as much artistic input they would like.  Maybe you would like to copy or recreate a pattern from a old picture for your Craftsman Style house for a fireplace surround or have a mural of your favorite fish swimming along your backsplash, whatever your fancy, Gothic Tile might be the place to find the special old world inspired tile work for your home.