06/03/2019
Spacial Think in Tile Setting
The question of proper tile installation and satisfactory workmanship has been an ongoing challenge since the advent of plastics introduced into construction. In my opinion the bottom line on a quality install relies on 3 major components,
1. Provable actual experience of the installer.
2. Years of proven training.
My biggest one I will explain is
3. Spacial thinking.
Lets dive into Spacial Thinking. Think of a square drawn on paper. It's a 2D shape obviously. Some look at the 4 lines and never go beyond them. We call them linear thinkers. Only sees what's in front of them and never able to go beyond. Whereas a spacial thinker begins to raise those 4 black or colored lines off the paper without ever touching them. Spacial thinkers begin to morph out other lines and move those lines into any imaginable shape. Spacial thinkers see in terms of 3D not 2D. We take those lines and make a 3D box, then in our minds start seeing solids. Those solids that were just lines are now being twisted, stretched, bent into whatever we desire that shape to be. So now we took a 2D sketch, committed it to memory, added more lines in our heads, then made it into a 3D object and filled it solid then bent it in all directions. That is the first trip into the mind of a spacial thinker. Apply the spacial mind into tike laying. Many cuts, curves, patterns, install techniques. A spacially experienced tile technician is different than an installer. Every facet of an install is a giant ruberic and requires multiple levels of thinking to troubleshoot along the way and yet autocorrect mistakes along the way.
Now lets talk simply about money. You $3,000.00 dollars for a install. The installer tiles were all crooked. Now its not able to be fixed. You have to hire another installer who aslo costs $3000.00.
You didn't vet either of them. You simply hired them because of a nice shirt, perhaps a nice car. The person looks clean. So not understanding how to hire a person with certain characteristics now cost you $6000.00 this happens all the time. A balance has to be achieved and standards must be in place to prove to the homeowner the person they are hiring has exceptional thinking skills to do complete just some of the many projects requiring deep level thinking.
An increasing number of installers are not using measurements and chalk lines to square up and lay out their tile installations.