Tabula Rasa

A full day of steady rain. Anne took the day off, mainly because a tile
supplier in town was having a 20% off sale on all tile orders. This
included slate slabs for countertops, so we couldn’t afford to pass it up.
We spent much of the morning figuring out the square footage of our
kitchen and bathrooms, as well as our countertop measurements. Then we hit
the store, and after a few hours of deliberation, ordered a few large
slabs of Montauk Blue slate for our countertop, and a bunch of Heathermore
and Strata Gray tiles for our floors. This was quite an accomplishment in
and of itself, for us to agree on colors, sizes and layouts, and the fact
that we saved over $400 to boot was icing on the cake. If we had stopped
there, the day would have been considered a success. But we had only begun
to interior decorate.
     On we traveled to Trikeenan Tile, an excellent, local, hand-made
artisan tile shop right in Keene. They make incredibly beautiful
high-end tiles, which are generally out of our modest price range.
But, bless their hearts, they sell seconds! An entire back room
filled with boxes of slightly imperfect or discontinued tiles. We
went to town, and after a bit of searching, discovered a few crates
of some blue-green tile that we both thought would look excellent in
our bathroom. After figuring out the number of tiles we would need,
the search was on! We went through hundreds of tiles, sorting out the
best ones that matched most closely in color and style. Midway
through, Anne came up with an excellent layout pattern that
incorporated smaller white tiles, which really made the greens and
blues pop. Over two hours later, with the help of some very patient
Trikeenan employees, we loaded five boxes of tile into the car. The
sell the seconds by the pound, and we ended up with 143 pounds worth.
Not bad—enough stunning, locally made tiles to do our entire
downstairs bathroom for $143.  Home Depot, Home Shmeepo.