Flooring or hearth first? Replacing both.

10 years ago

I decided now that the kitchen is mostly done, the carpet in the adjoining great room needs to go. It's old and stained. We love the new cork in the kitchen, but I think we will end up with wood floor in this room.

The hearth also needed to be enlarged to fit the mantel, which has now become a complete FP overhaul. I wanted to do that first before the floor. Now that it's all framed out, I need to tile it.

I have a lovely charcoal grey pebble tile and matching stacked pebble border to use, see pic.

So the question is, do I tile down to the subfloor and put the new flooring in around it (and what to do where they meet?), wait until we put in the new floor (at least a few months) and tile down to the floor, or put a spacer at the bottom to account for floor height and tile what will be above the floor.

Any thoughts? I figured learning to tile would be the hard part, but I'm learning it's the dozens of little details that really trip me up and highlight my lack of experience. Any and all suggestions would be appreciated!

Comments (4)

martinkk333
10 years ago
I would say tile the floor or at the very least leave the space where the tile will be and tile above it. If you go all the way down to the floor with those stacked stones, it will be extremely hard to cut the floor tile around them.
goodbyekitty
10 years ago
We're getting ready to do the very same thing too. Not only that but also using a pebble tile like that in front of our sliding glass door. I was thinking of laying the wood floor down first then laying the tile down afterwards.
Related Professionals
Brandon Flooring Contractors · Knoxville Flooring Contractors · Land O' Lakes Flooring Contractors · Redmond Flooring Contractors · San Bruno Flooring Contractors · South Plainfield Flooring Contractors · Woodstock Flooring Contractors · Bartlesville General Contractors · Chatsworth General Contractors · De Pere General Contractors · Franklin General Contractors · Niles General Contractors · Parkville General Contractors · Rolling Hills Estates General Contractors · Wyomissing General Contractors
williamsem
Original Author
10 years ago
AR_kiki, that is exactly my concern!

Goodbyekitty, that sounds nice! If you have a minute, post some pics when you are done! We can be the start of the unofficial "pebble tile meets wood" thread :-)

Looks like I should plan a space of some sort.
goodbyekitty
10 years ago
Mine is just a tad bit different, but I will post before and after pictures. The fireplace hearth is level with the floor so I will probably be pulling up old tile and then lay down the new pebble tile to match the pebble tile in front of the sliding glass door.

I'm afraid of my change turning into a big project too; my fireplace is right up against the living room wall (that I can't change), the brick appears to be whitewashed; I can change that but that is for another post soon. I'm just happy we are finally within a couple of weeks of putting an order in for wood floors.