Choosing Grout

After tiling my kitchen floor I needed to choose a grout.  There are a lot of choices out there.  I used a natural slate in the color peacock and I wanted a color grout to bring out some of the reds in the floor so I went with a product called Spectralock and I choose it because they had a much wider color range than the others.

You buy a pail of the epoxy mix, sponge, gloves and instructions for $15.98 at Lowe's and then the color is an extra $3.98. It was supposed to cover 16 sq ft and ended up only covering 9 sq ft so I had to use 12 units.  This was because my grout lines were wider than I had thought when I did the calculations.

The lesson here is if you are on a budget (and even if you’re not) be sure you measure correctly  before you calculate how much the project will cost because mine ran over by quite a bit.  Had I known this in advance I probably would have gone the conventional route.

 I was worried at first because the color didn't really match the sample on the box but once it completely cured it was pretty accurate to their color guide, which was brick red.

 This grout is good for the kitchen because it will never stain and never needs sealing and really, mixing the small pails one at a time gave me time to rest between pails. It was kind of the consistency of oily cookie dough.  In fact, rather than trowel it on I rolled it into snakes and pressed it into each space.  Then I used a wet sponge and float to force it in and level it off.   I pre-sealed my tile so it was a snap to force it into the spaces and then clean it up. There was very little waste. It was hard work but I really enjoyed it. It was very satisfying to get to the end of the job, my first ever tiling experience.

I can recommend this product for looks and ease but  it is more expensive than your standard water mixable grout so you need to be prepared for that but it's much easier to put in and easier to clean up and the look is awesome.  

It's been down for a year now and the color is still perfect and there has been no staining and believe me, there has been plenty spilled on it.