Black tiled baths, part deux

Back in April, I wrote a post about the black penny-tiled floor at Allen & Delancey in NYC, which struck me as supremely chic. Someone just brought to my attention Remodelista’s excellent round-up of the subject, including a bath at Austin’s Hotel Saint Cecilia, above. Check it out here! (Remodelista also links to a great post on Door Sixteen about blogger/book-cover designer Anna’s awesome obsidian floor and how he achieved it–you must take a look.)

Via Remodelista

Black On Black

Yesterday was the Tileist’s birthday. To celebrate my advanced age, my better half whisked me off to Allen & Delancey on the Lower East Side for dinner. Although I’d read numerous reviews of the joint’s ironic-speakeasy decor, none had mentioned the fantabulous tiled loo! The walls were lined with greenish-blue ceramic subway tiles with a stunning, gloopy glaze that must have been hand applied. Possibly the tiles were antique? But the best part was the floor: black penny rounds set in matching black grout. So simple, so chic–so superpractical for a high-traffic bathroom. Normally I dig pennies set into a contrasting grout that shows off their graphic, circular forms. But this room made me reconsider the advantages of tone-on-tone. A web search for “black penny tile” turned up these from Penny Tile (of course!) in Wisconsin, who makes them in oodles of colors–and noncolors, too.