A tile design should have enough faces that a customer cannot spot the repeat once the floor is laid. For calm looks that can be a handful of faces. For bold marble or wood looks on large floors it needs considerably more.
There is no standard that sets a minimum. The right number is the one that passes a mock-up layout at the size of a real room. This article gives a working rule and the method to test it. For what faces are and how they are printed, see face variation in digital tiles.
A working rule by look
These are rules of thumb, not standards. Use them to decide when to ask harder questions:
- Plain colours, cement and fine concrete looks hide repeats well and can work with few faces.
- Soft stone looks with light, even veining need a moderate number, because a strong vein makes a face easy to spot.
- Bold marble with dark veins shows the repeat quickly, so ask for a high face count and look at it laid out.
- Wood-look planks show knots and grain lines, so ask for a high face count and check that no knot lines up across a row.
- Terrazzo and speckle looks are forgiving, unless a large chip or fleck appears in the same place on several faces.
A working rule by size
Size changes the picture. A 600x600 tile and an 800x1600 slab can come from the same design, but the large one shows more of each face. In a room of the same area, there are far fewer large tiles, yet each repeat is more visible because the feature is bigger.
Small formats such as 300x300 or 400x400 are forgiving because a face covers little area. Large formats need more faces, or a calmer look. If a factory offers the same face count for every size of a design, ask why.
How to check it on a mock-up
A single sample tile tells you nothing about faces. Use a laid-out check instead:
- Ask the factory to lay at least 10 to 15 square metres of the design on the warehouse floor, taken at random from several boxes.
- Photograph it from standing height and from a corner, the way a customer sees a room.
- Look for the same vein, knot or mark appearing in a regular pattern, and count how often it repeats.
- Ask for the factory's digital layout render as well, but treat it as a guide, because real production can differ from the file.
- Repeat the check with tiles from a production run, not only from the showroom stock.
If you cannot visit, ask for a video walking along the laid tiles, filmed without cuts. A photograph of a single tile, or of four hand-picked tiles, is not enough.
Put it in the order
Once you approve a design, write the number of faces into the purchase order for each size. Ask that faces are mixed within each box and across pallets. Keep photographs of the approved mock-up with the order, so you can compare them with production.
Face count also matters for reorders. If a factory later rebuilds a design with fewer faces, the new batch may not blend with stock already in your warehouse. Ask the factory to confirm the face count each time you reorder. Shade is a separate check, covered in shade and batch numbers.
Next step
We arrange random mock-ups at the factory and check them against your approved photographs before loading. To see how this fits a first order, book a free sourcing review.