Minton Encaustic Floor Tiles

For the floors in his extensions walter chose encaustic tile for its beauty durability and sophistication.

Minton encaustic floor tiles. A short history of the encaustic tile chris blanchett tile historian in the 13th century no self respecting abbey monastery or royal palace would have been without its tiled floors. Boote campbell carter chamberlain copeland garrett craven dunnill godwin maw minton and minton hollins. Mintons encaustic tile floor at the united states capitol 1856 minton s two sons thomas and herbert were taken into partnership in 1817 but thomas went in to the church and was ordained in 1825. The pattern appears inlaid into the body of the tile so that the design remains as the tile is worn down.

Reclaimed encaustic and ceramic floor wall and hearth tiles in the neo medieval gothic revival style of a. Browse the porcelain tile options here. Became a big supplier of this tile for public buildings and palaces in mid 1800s. Encaustic tiles many of the manufacturers of plain geometric tiles also made encaustic patterned tiles using a medieval technique re invented by herbert minton which involved inlaying layers of different coloured clays to create a design.

Encaustic tiles may be glazed or unglazed and the inlay may be as. The industry was further revolutionized in the 1840s by the dust pressing method which consisted of compressing nearly dry clay between two metal dies. The earliest examples such as those still extant at fountains abbey in yorkshire were made of variously shaped interlocking tiles of different colours much like a mosaic but these were. Encaustic tiles are ceramic tiles in which the pattern or figure on the surface is not a product of the glaze but of different colors of clay they are usually of two colours but a tile may be composed of as many as six.

Pugin by celebrated makers such as. Encaustic tiles originally referred to patterned unglazed ceramic floor tiles where the colours came from the natural colours of the clay used with the colour running all through the tile. Herbert had been working in the business since 1808 when he was 16 initially as a travelling salesman. Walter was engaged in the design and construction of vast additions to the capitol 1851 1865.

The richly patterned and colored minton tile floors are one of the most striking features of the extensions of the united states capitol. Knowing how to restore and clean encaustic floor tiles is key to keeping a victorian or edwardian hallway in top condition.