We have to redo our bathroom due to water damage and I hate the idea of picking out tile which I will have to live with for the rest of my life. I don’t even know where to start. Help!
That’s why I have white subway tiles in my bathroom. I love it. It reflects the light and it’s pretty timeless. In one bathroom I have a border which I adore (but sadly is no longer available) which was a combination of tumbled sea green glass and chrome squares, the other bathroom has a iridescent glass border. That bathroom has periwinkle blue walls for a shot of color. If I get sick of it, I can repaint easily. The first bathroom has a l2x12 slate-look porcelain tiles. Very neutral, still very happy with it. The other bathroom I put in a white and black mosaic tile - since I was doing a curbless shower and wanted the whole floor to be the same, I didn’t want to use a big tile.
My best advice is to go through kitchen magazines, tile stores, Houzz, pinterest pages and see what appeals.
If your water contains a lot of iron or magnesium, you will want a darker grout and possibly darker tiles. If you have hard water, you will want lighter tiles and grout.
If you have Lowe’s nearby, they have a free design service (of course, if you buy their products). They really helped us to choose cabinets and sink. For the tile, I wanted something a bit more upscale so I just went to a tile store and spent hours there until I found the tile I liked. The specialized stores have employees who can give advice, too. I looked on Houzz too, but didn’t really like anything.
This was really tough for us too because there are so many darn choices!
In the end our process was to first off try to choose something in keeping with the period and style of the house (it’s 114 years old so that eliminated all the contemporary options). Second, we looked at the other bathrooms in the house and tried to pull some inspiration so we wouldn’t have one bathroom that would stick out too much. Third, I spent way too many hours on Houzz and the internet looking for pictures that appealed to me to at least get a sense of the color pallet. Fourth, we set a budget (important since costs can vary widely). Lastly, we walked around design showrooms looking for more inspiration. In the end, our contractor sent us to a large flooring store and we were able to settle on something we both liked. We went with marble because of the age of the house and got a great price.
We did opt to do a larger format floor tile to minimize the grout lines and then a subway tile (but larger than standard) for the shower walls. We are doing grey grout.
In my last house we had porcelain that looked like slate for the floors that we adored but it was too rustic for this house.
For our master bath remodel, we “hired” our then 14-year old to be a designer and pick out tile/countertops/colors/fixtures/ etc. The result is stunning, our D is extremely proud of her work and some extra money she earned vs. getting an allowance, hubby and I are joking that we got a return on investment into years of art classes 
We had water damage to our bathroom floor. We needed to renovate anyway, so we gutted the room.
We visited Galleria and TileAmerica stores and after looking at stone and porcelain tiles, we opted for porcelain, which does not require sealant or special care. The tile we chose for our bathroom floor and our curbless shower walls and ceiling was Carnevale porcelain tile at TileAmerica. The color we chose was Grigio (gray). I find this tile very easy on the eyes. I’m happy with our choice.
https://www.tileamerica.com/tile-products?product_id=290&category_id=10
This is a tough porcelain tile with a PEI hardness rating of 4. It’s very easy care. More on hardness ratings: https://www.builddirect.com/learning-center/flooring/porcelain-tile-rated-hardness/
Tileamerica has matching colors of grout as well. Be sure to seal the grout. You can mix the grout with a sealant.
For the saddle at the threshold to the hallway, we found marble that matched the color pretty closely. TileAmerica had that.
For the shower floor we used Daltile Desert Gray Speckle, 2" squares (PEI rating of 3).
I noticed when looking at tiles at The Home Depot that many of their tiles had lower hardness ratings and would be good for walls but not for floors. Be sure to get floor tiles that are rated for floors.
You also want to make sure your floor is not too slippery. There’s a rating for that too. Using smaller tiles will also make the floor less slippery. Before we remodeled our kitchen I almost killed myself many times because it had this horrible tile that was way too slippery when it got wet.
I agree, and I’ll add that the Carnevale and Desert Gray Speckle tile we chose are not slippery; they have a somewhat rough surface. We were quite concerned about the risk of slipping, as we want to age in place here.
Along those lines, if you are redoing walls, I urge you to have blocking put into the walls and install grab bars that double as towel bars. We chose bars by Delta.
I went to a tile company that had tons of options. I picked porcelain & a really good grout. The place was kind of a pain to work with, because they don’t sell to the consumer. My brother did the tile work, and he fortunately has a business so could order through them. I didn’t like anything at the big box stores, and I didn’t want natural stone.
Thank you for all the great ideas. I would have never thought of some of this stuff.
If the bathroom is a small master bath, can I get away with the larger tile? I hate cleaning grout!
I wish I had someone like @typiCAmom 'a D! Maybe I can enlist the help of D24.
Floors. If you like the look of wood, take a look at wood-like tiles. Some of them are so realistic, you would not believe it is tile.
Walls. I’d go with a neutral tile like mathmom’s subway.
No large tile on the floor of shower for me - grout lines provide traction. Get epoxy grout at least for the shower floor. It needs no sealant and is impermeable.
Our bathroom is about 6’ x 8’ and the long tiles look just fine. But in the shower I agree that you need small tiles for traction-- or at least tiles that are very textured.
And I did not mean to call the Carnevale tiles rough-- textured is the right word-- but still not textured enough for the shower.
Do you have a Tile Shop near you? They have 15 or so bathrooms mocked up, with fixtures, tile, the works. If you are uncertain, I would pick a vignette there that you like and say, “I’ll take that one, please.” When I’ve liked my selections the most, it has been because I took a picture or something similar and basically reproduced it, right down to the paint color. It also might help if you stop thinking of tile as forever. Nothing’s forever!
I have to look for a Tile Shop. There are some very high end kitchen and bath showrooms I’m trying to avoid. There must be something middle of the road. There is a Lowes nearby.
We have large tiles on our bathroom floor but small hexagonal ones on the shower floor.
I suggest you visit some of the ‘high end” tile stores and look at their displays as suggested in another post to give you some design ideas. Take pictures of what you like and then head on over to Lowes and HomeDepot and ask them for help in recreating the look at a fraction of the costs.
Yes to @Gumbymom’s suggestion. The high end places can give you great ideas. Our kitchen designer sent me to this crazy expensive place, and then the contractor recommended going to his floor place. We saved a ton because he used his contractor discount, but for the same look.
Chiming in that going to look at high end tile stores is a good idea. You could also look at kitchen and bath stores which also often have tile displays.
Why does it have to be tile? Is this for a shower? There are a lot of other options.