I am getting new quartz countertops soon (they come to measure on Monday). I also will be getting a new backsplash. What is the going opinion of glass tiles? I think they are beautiful, but are they too trendy? I am going for a neutral, classic “forever” look. The tiles I have looked at are beige so no particular color.
When I redid my kitchen the contractor talked me out of getting a glass tile backsplash, saying it was too trendy and would soon be out of style. Now here we are eight years later and they are still going strong. I say get whatever makes your heart sing. No matter how classic a look we strive for, everything eventually goes out of style. Might as well get what you enjoy.
@musicmom1215 what size/shape of glass tile are you looking at? IMO the thin, horizontal type glass tile or strips is more trendy, a bigger subway like tile (doesn’t have to be subway) is more classic.
Are you choosing beige for a reason? Like an off white or like a tan?
We are about to put a mixed media (glass and stone) backsplash in our laundry room. It is in a herringbone pattern and is really pretty. I don’t really think it looks trendy, and there are tons of glass tiles for sale in all of the tile stores, both the big box tile places, as well as the more expensive “designer” tile places. I think you are fine to go with glass tile.
When we did our kitchen I used diamond tiles in a beige with small glass tiles as accents- halfway up every few feet (so maybe a dozen overall). I think I should have used more of the glass tiles.
I have glass tiles in my master bath—built the house almost 20 years ago and they still look like new.
@abasket The ones I saw were like subway tiles. I am waiting until the countertops are installed so I can test them together in the lighting in my kitchen. The countertop is sort of a marble look with cream, light gray, and light golden beige. My cabinets are a light cream or off-white color. Here is the countertop, although it really looks a lot better in real life. https://www.homedepot.com/p/LG-Hausys-Viatera-3-in-x-3-in-Quartz-Countertop-Sample-in-Soprano-LG-M008-VT/304626081
I spent this afternoon at a charity event where you tour a house where a few dozen designers each redo a room. These are the trends I noticed.
The hot color is teal - lots of mixing of blues in different shades of what I would call teal
Elaborate tiles - for example the kitchen backsplash was a very fancy mosaic pattern with circles of blues.
Big print wallpaper - and I mean big - with large flowers and birds and plants - and I mean large (the parrots were life size). Lots of grass cloth wallpaper also.
Bearskin style rugs but in crazy painted colors - some where actually hide (I assume leather?)
Popular accents pieces were - objects made of glass (flowers, butterflies, chihully style ceiling fixture.), books (one designer actually had bought several feet of old books with green covers) , and Asian elements (Chinese fu dog, etc.)
Lots of those ceiling light fixtures that look like branches with twinkly lights.
What I would consider clashing colors like eggplant purple with green, or a room with pastel blues and pink and then a bright yellow chair.
Ceilings painted much darker than the walls (in one case the ceiling was purple another was a white room with a beige ceiling.)
@kiddie That event sounds interesting. My house has none of those things, so I’m definitely not trendy. I do love the elaborate tile backsplashes, but I think that is a trend that will be over before I’m ready to redo again!
It is a huge fundraiser for a local hospital - typically run as “Mansion in May” but was postponed to be “Splendor in September.” They do it every 2-3 years. They select a huge house on a nice piece of property that is for sale. The designers work for a few months installing their rooms (some of it is fake - like the sinks are not really hooked up to the plumbing). Sadly, at the end of the event, everything is stripped back out of the house (including the gardens).
I agonized over the kitchen backsplash tile. I like so much of what is out there, but I also didn’t want to date the kitchen by going too trendy. Plus the house is 100+ years old.
We ended up going with a subway tile but it’s an elongated shape with a slight crackle finish. It looks beautiful. For behind the stone I had the tile layer do a herringbone pattern that is framed with a rope tile. I hope it will continue to look timeless.
I would be stressed out with so much bold color! I like having a color (or two) for some impact, but what you described would literally cause me anxiety, lol.
I thought of a couple of other things that have been discussed here. There were no stainless appliances in any of the kitchen rooms - the ranges and the range hoods were blue. I did look online and Viking is making blue ovens.
In several rooms they didn’t stick to one kind of metal. So gold-toned and silver-toned lived side by side. In a small powder room a gold framed mirror was over a sink a stainless faucet.
I never thought show home tours were really designed to show trends; more for the decorator to show off their talents. At times they take more creative liberties that normal designs!
Colored appliances are big here too, especially ranges. We saw many of them when we were looking at the house. I think in the right house they can look awesome. We briefly considered one for our house but the good ones were out of our budget and the entry level ones were clearly meant for show and not daily use (the oven door fell off in my hand in the showroom).
I have been to a bunch of these Mansion in May events. Some years every room is just crazy, with the designer being creative and no rooms could actually be lived in. This year all the rooms were very livable (which was refreshing).
I find that the trends do follow after what I see at these events (although they may take a few years). I remember one year saying why were all the rooms grey and sure enough grey took over the world a year or two later. Also, when I see something in a large percentage of rooms, I know it is going to trend big (like this year with so much teal).
Part of the event is that the designers have many of the furnishings in the room for sale (with a part of the proceeds benefiting the charity). For that reason, they tend to not be as over the top.
@snowball is correct. Those are not trends; they are designer competitions/showcases and are not meant to depict anything that would work in a livable home. However, elements of these extreme facades may reflect some changing tastes. For example, wallpaper is definitely back with larger, often geometric patterns, but used only on an accent wall, not all over. Animal prints/hides almost never go out of style but, again, in small doses, perhaps a cowhide pillow on an accent chair. Dark ceilings don’t work in the average size room with ceilings under 10’ as that treatment causes a room to “shrink.” And blue has never gone out of style whatever the current shade.
We are putting a really beautiful grasscloth wallpaper in our powder room in our remodel. I’ve always wanted grasscloth wallpaper.
We wanted to get a new fridge for our rental house prior to selling it and ordered one a week or two ago. Today I get an email telling us what was to arrive in Sept is not put off until Nov! I have a feeling we’ll be selling the house without a fridge.
The plus to that is the new owner can pick their own color I suppose.
I’m not cancelling our order until we’re sure the new owner doesn’t want it. If we don’t have a buyer by the time the fridge would arrive, we’ll still get the new one. Supposedly houses are selling very quickly though. I just don’t know if that will hold true once we have it repainted and the floors plus some repairs done. Hopefully…
I’ve wondered how much the damage from the hurricanes/fires have added to the demand for house “stuff.”
I think it’s the perfect storm of supply chain issues. Manufacturing got shut down, shipping is delayed and more demand due to people staying home and diverted money from traveling