105 year old 18.25m2 / 195 sq ft antique ceramic floor

A quality ceramic tile this handmade period floor comes with its original border configuration and its four full size and eight half size border corner tiles.

The floor totals 18.25 m2 / 195 sq ft in surface area.

Comprising of 14.2cm sq field and large border tiles, the floor has been reclaimed from the entrance hall and reception rooms of a town house in Villers-sur-Coudon in the Oise department of Picardy, northern France. A reverse inscription of the tiles 'O C' confirms they were manufactured by Carrelages Ceramiques Octave Colozier & Cie, St Just-des-Marais. The floor appeared in the Octave Colozier Catalogue of 1913 and a scan of the presentation page is included below along with some high resolution photographs of a cleaned section of the floor. We have also included a scan of the factory at St Just-des-Marais. Despite the slow and labour intensive handmade production, where tiles were made in twin moulds, Octave Colozier & Cie were producing over 35 million tiles a year (700,000 m2 / 2.3 million ft sq) by 1912! The factories have long since closed but records remain of the tiles being used decoratively on the walls of the office buildings, built at the beginning of the twentieth century.

The floor is classical and geometrical in its design presenting a pretty floral themed motif in a spearmint green with a chocolate brown framing across its four tile tessellation. There is vieux rose, yellow and teal also in the palette and all on a white slip. Both borders take from the same palette with the main floral themed large border framed by two block lined half sized borders, laid in duplicate.

The floor is in good condition, some tiles display small chips and edge nibbles, all groutable, but the 15mm thick ceramic is very good quality and the slip colours are consistent, as a photographed random section of the floor below shows. It has cleaned very well of its old lime based mortar and years of wax and arrives ready to relay requiring only a regular wash to maintain its beauty.

The floor can be laid inside or outside of the home, where high summer and sub zero winter temperatures will not effect the tile and they can be used with underfloor heating systems.

Tile quantities, give or take one or two:-

Field tiles - 720 tiles - 14.4M2 / 155 sq ft.

Large border tiles - 88 plus 4 corner tiles - 1.8m2 / 19.6 sq ft or 12.9 linear metres / 42.25 linear feet

Small border tiles - 190 plus 8 corner tiles - 1.9m2 / 20.4 sq ft or 27 linear metres / 88.6 linear feet

PLUS free offcuts.

NOTE
Antique tiles were most commonly made in single or two tile moulds. Before current computer automation methods their moulds were made my hand and the colour slips mixed by eye. Kiln temperatures could also be variable, as could the firing time. The result is that often tiles display subtle size and thickness variations and there can be tonal variations in colours, owing to the slip mixing and/or firing time. All of this makes these handmade tiles unique and adds to their charm. Some floors display their subtle variations in size and tones, some not, but when photographing we always take a random section of the floor so that it is representative of the whole. A tiler should always dry lay a section of the tiles to familiarise himself with them before starting to fix lay.