Category: Step by Step Instructions
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Mosaic Baptismal Font
Artist Sondra Jonson recently completed a mosaic baptismal font for St. James Catholic Church using our gold glass mosaic and metallic glass tile and vitreous glass tile, and it turned out really well. Religious architecture is supposed to be instructive and inspiring, and so Sondra used a spiral galaxy motif for the bottom of the font and a night sky with stars for the…
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Shrinking Grout: Fixing Holes In Groutlines
Grout does not shrink, but it is prone to forming voids and bubbles if it is not rubbed thoroughly into the grout gaps. These holes are easily repaired. My friend Fredrik reported a problem while grouting his mosaic portraits of famous rock icons. He described the grout as having shrank in the grout gap. Shrinking Grout Detail…
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Removing Glass Tile To Change A Mosaic
This method for altering a mosaic can be used before grouting, or grout can first be removed by scraping it out with a grout removal tool or screwdriver. Why Remove Tiles? Even experienced artists modify their designs as they work on them, and beginners can’t help but use a trial and error approach. After all. it’s hard…
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Using Contact Paper to Transfer A Mosaic Design
Choice of Pattern This method for transferring a mosaic design with contact paper works whether you are improvising on a quickly sketched cartoon or carefully following a detailed pattern for each piece of tile. This method reverses the mosaic from left to right in a mirror effect because the tile is laid upside down onto the sticky pattern and…
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How To Transfer Mosaic Patterns Quickly By Tracing
This article explains how to use a charcoal pencil (or graphite pencil) to color the back side of a paper pattern and then trace over the pattern firmly to transfer it to a plywood mosaic backer board. I have written a separate article explaining why tracing borrowed images is better than drawing for making patterns for small mosaics -even…
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How To Make Mosaic Patterns Without Drawing
You can and should spend more time “drawing” with tile than drawing with a pencil when most of the details in the mosaic are about the size the smallest piece of tile that can be cut. If the smallest details of your design are larger than multiple tiles, then you should draw a detailed pattern, but most mosaic plaques…
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Choosing Mosaic Colors Based On Contrast
Recently artist Jill Miller emailed me wanting some advice about choosing colors for a mosaic table top she was making, and the design she was a chickadee bird with holly leaves and berries. From her photos and a description of the colors she wanted to use for the border of the round table top, it was…
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Mosaic Pizza Oven
Mosaic Fireplace and Oven Surrounds: The Basics A couple of years ago, I wrote a page explaining how glass, ceramic, and stone tiles can be used for mosaic fireplace surrounds and how the tiles should be mounted with thinset mortar or white PVA (polyvinyl acetate) adhesives such as Weldbond. But we are talking about the SURROUNDS, not…
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Mosaic Guitar
Artist MC Holt-Evans of Nashville recently made a mosaic sculpture very much in keeping with spirit of The Music City, and her mosaic guitar is worth taking a look at, especially if you are considering making a mosaic on an improvised base such as a musical instrument or a piece of furniture. The instructions below…
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Small Glass Mosaic Instructions
These instructions explain how to set up and make a small mosaic from glass mosaic tile. I use our new hardwood mosaic coaster bases with 12mm Elementile recycled glass mosaic tile as an example, and I show how to set up your studio work space in ways that control dust and sharp splinters of glass.…
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Mosaic Transfer Instructions
Yesterday I wrote up some recommendations and instructions for Outdoor School Mosaics that focused on a project where each child made a mosaic stepping stone on a paver to be arranged in a crazy quilt design. I forgot to clarify that those instructions were written for younger students and beginners needing to play around with tile…
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How To Cut Marble Small
Recently a customer emailed me asking how to cut a piece of marble mosaic tile into very small pieces. He reported that he could easily cut the marble tile into thirds by making straight cuts, but when he attempted smaller pieces or diagonal cuts, the marble would crumble or break into jagged pieces The customer verified…