A/. Notes on Mosaic design including:- opus vermiculatum / opus musivicum / opus palladinium / opus sectile / opus regulatum
B/. What are the Health and safety implications or risks?
C/. Notes on Mosaic making techniques including:- The Direct method / The indirect (reverse) method
D/. Notes on What Materials to use for making mosaics including:- Crockery / Household tiles / Vitreous glass / Smalti / Glass / Shells / Found objects / Backing materials (Substrates)
E/. Notes regarding Adhesives including:- Adhesives / Epoxy resin / Bathroom sealant
F/. Notes on Tools for making mosaics including:- Dust mask / Small paint brush / Rubber gloves (for grouting) / Tweezers / Goggles / Tile nippers / Tile cutters
G/. Notes on Grouting mosaics including:- Grout / Colouring grout
H/. Notes on The Most asked Questions including:-

• Can you recommend any good books on the subject?

• How do you keep the final level of a piece flat when using different types of china, etc.?

• I want to do a large floor mosaic under a rustic arbour and seat . I've collected a few tiles, but can I use shards on the ground?

• I'm terrible at drawing?

• I am having a difficult time finding interesting china pieces?

• I've been trying to get up enough courage to touch and inhale mastic bond.

• How do you make mosiacs like vases and other irregular objects?

• What can I do to prevent small cracks in the grout?

• When do you use sanded grout versus unsanded grout?

• What material, besides broken dishes, do I need?

I/. Grumpy`s Guide to Mosaic workshop,

 

Mosaic design

As well as the choice of materials, colours and design, a number of extra factors affect the overall appearance of a mosaic:

 

• the size and shapes of the pieces

• the size of the interstices (the gaps or "grouting joints" between pieces)

• the colour of the grout

• On top of this, the way the pieces and grouting joints are aligned can be used to give a visual "flow" to the mosaic. This flow is called "andamento" and can be used in a number of ways and combinations of techniques. These have different names to describe the kind of work ("opus") involved. (There is sometimes some overlap in the way these terms are used.)

 

opus vermiculatum:This takes its name from the Latin for 'worm'. It refers to lines of tesserae that snake around a feature in the mosaic. Often two or three rows of opus vermiculatum appear like a halo around something in a mosaic picture, helping it stand out from the background.

opus musivicuM: This is an effect rather like ripples on a pond, with repeated rows of tesserae which spread out to fill a background, as in the background to this fish tile.

opus palladinium:A "crazy pavement" effect, with a random appearance.

opus sectile;This is a technique where, instead of being made up of lots of individual tesserae, shapes in a picture are made from larger, specially cut, pieces (perhaps of tile or stone). more about opus sectile

opus regulatum; As the name suggests, this is a very regular pattern, like bricks in a wall, or squares on a chess board.

 

Health and safety:

This is important!

Know the hazards associated with any tools, materials, adhesives etc you are using, and take appropriate care.

You must wear safety goggles whenever you are breaking up mosaic materials. Chips can fly off at high speed over surprising distances.

A dust mask will protect you from breathing in dust from broken ceramics etc, or when mixing cement grout.

Don't bring food or drink into the area where you're working.

Make sure you've got access to clean water and plasters just in case you do cut yourself.

 

Mosaic making techniques

People often think that mosaics are made by pressing the pieces (tesserae) into a background medium, such as cement. This is one possible way, but the most widely used techniques are the direct method and the indirect method.

 

With the direct method, the tesserae are stuck firmly into place to a backing surface. When the adhesive has dried, grout is applied to the mosaic to fill in the gaps. This is the technique demonstrated in my house number plate project 1.

 

The indirect (reverse) method involves sticking tesserae face down on to a temporary surface (such as a sheet of brown paper) with a water-soluble glue (e.g. wallpaper paste). When set, the entire mosaic can be taken to its final site and pressed into a bed of adhesive or cement. When it is set in place, the paper can be soaked off and grouting completed from the front surface.

 

The indirect technique is very useful, for example, where it would be difficult to spend time making the mosaic in its eventual location. This might be the case for a large outdoors mosaic, or a wall mosaic high off the ground. More about this method...

 

Another way of using the indirect method would be to make a paving stone (where a flat surface is needed). The tesserae are stuck down to paper as before. When dry, a mould is placed over the mosaic and filled with a mortar or concrete mix, to create a slab containing the mosaic (still face down). This is given plenty of time to set and then released from the mould. The paper is soaked off and grouting of the front of the mosaic is completed.

 

The indirect method can also be used to make mosaics in moulds, as in my plant holders and owl

 

Materials for making mosaics

 

When deciding what materials to use in your mosaic, there are a number of practical things to take into account:

 

• Are the materials suitable for where the mosaic will be placed or used? For example, if the mosaic will go out of doors, will the materials survive frost and rain?

• If the mosaic will go under foot, will the materials stand up to wear and tear?

• Will the materials will give you a flat surface, if this is needed?

• How much of the materials will you need and how much will they cost?

 

Notes on various materials:

Crockery: Often cheap (or free) to get. Can be quirky, fun and evocative ("memoryware"). Can be difficult to get flat surfaces, or a lot the same. May be damaged by frost. The material of choice for pique assiette style.

Household tiles: Can be fairly cheap, particularly if you can get offcuts or spares. Second-hand tiles stripped off walls usually have adhesive on the back, which is a problem to clean off. Vary a lot in quality, thickness and ease of cutting between different types. May be damaged by frost.

Vitreous glass: (right) More expensive. Wide range of colours available. Flat surface. Suitable for outdoor projects. Can be tricky to learn to cut and shape.

Smalti: Expensive. Wide range of colours available. Classical appearance.

Glass: Stained glass comes in a range of colours. Cost depends on source - scrap glass relatively cheap, may vary in thickness. Can be used outdoors. Backing and adhesives must be chosen with care, as may be visible through glass. Mirror glass can be very effective.

Shells: Cheap. Fun to collect. Frost-hardy. Too porous to be grouted in the normal way, as they will stain.

Found objects: Many found objects can be incorporated into a mosaic if you wish ­ metal, plastic, stone, even teeth! ­ if they are stuck down firmly.

Backing materials: If you browse through books or web sites you'll see that virtually any object can be mosaicked. The most commonly used backing is wood. This should be of a kind that will not warp, for example a fibre board (such as MDF) or plywood. If it will go out of doors, an exterior grade wood should be chosen. The back of a tile can be used very successfully as a mosaic base, as it is porous and gives very good adhesion.

 

It is usual to prepare wooden surfaces by priming and scoring them. Priming involves painting on a coat of diluted PVA glue (about one part glue to 5-10 parts water). This seals the surface, meaning that glue and grout will not dry too quickly. Scoring lines with a craft knife or Stanley knife makes the surface rougher, giving a better grip.

 

Notes regarding Adhesives

Adhesives: Choice of adhesive is important. For most purposes, PVA (Poly Vinyl Acetate) glue is ideal (also known as "white craft glue"). This is widely available. Generally the most cost-effective way of buying it is in quantity from a builders' merchant. It is fairly quick drying (within several hours), moderately water-resistant when dry, and relatively low hazard.

 

Household tile adhesive: Good "grab" for 3-D projects. Useful where the tesserae are not flat, as it can fill the space behind. Generally relatively low hazard.

Epoxy resin: Very strong. Fast setting versions available. Good for non-porous contacts e.g. with metal, or where quick repairs needed. High hazard, not pleasant to use.

Bathroom sealant: Very effective for ceramic-to-ceramic bonds. High "grab", so good for 3-D work. Can work out relatively costly.

 

Tools for making mosaics

What do you need? As well as the goggles and tools shown here, you'll want to have a dust mask, a small paint brush (for applying glue) and rubber gloves (for grouting). Tweezers are useful too, for placing mosaic pieces.

 

Goggles for eye protection are essential.

Tile nippers: are the tool I use most of all. They are the one tool you will really need to get you started. You only need to place a few millimetres of the jaws of the nippers over the edge of whatever you are cutting - more than that and it becomes very hard work indeed. You are not trying to crush your way through, just make a nip which will send a break across the whole piece of crockery or tile.

 

Tile cutters: score a straight line on the tile and then snap it along the line. Hand-held tile cutters can be useful if you plan to cut a lot of tiles, glass or vitreous glass tiles. You can buy ones which sit flat on the bench these are generally a bit more expensive. With these, again, a cutting wheel scores a line in the glaze. The tile can then be snapped along this line. Being able to hold the tile still with one hand, and having the larger handle during scoring and snapping are big advantages

 

Grouting mosaics

 

Grout is the material which goes in between the tesserae (the pieces which make up the mosaic). You can use ready-mixed household tile grout or a cement-based grout. This is more waterproof. It can be bought as a powder, to be mixed with water, or you can make your own - the most simple recipe is one part cement to three parts sand. Cement is very caustic so you need to wear gloves and take safety precautions.

 

Water is added to a small heap of powdered grout and mixed to a creamy consistency, then spread it on, forcing it down into all the gaps with your fingers or a spreader.

 

As the grout dries on the surface of the tesserae, brush it off with an old toothbrush. Work inwards from the edge, taking care not to dislodge grout from between the pieces of crockery. Cleaning off grout at this stage will save a lot of work later, although set grout can be cleaned off with sandpaper. Allow the grout to set overnight, but don't put it in a warm place as slow drying will give the piece more strength. Go over it again with a brush and then a soft cloth to remove the remaining haze and dust of grout.

 

Colouring grout: Whether you use a ready-mixed grout or a cement-based powder grout, you can change the colour of it by using acrylic paints. Bear in mind that this may change the consistency (and perhaps the drying time) of your grout, and it takes an awful lot of paint to affect cement grout if it is already grey or brown. There are, however, dyes available for colouring cement. You can even paint acrylic paint on to the grout when it's dry, although this can be very fiddly.

 

If you're colouring the grout, mix up enough to do the whole of your mosaic. Otherwise it's very difficult to match the colour in a second batch. Remember that the grout will be a bit lighter in colour when it has dried.

 

A couple more tips: if you can't decide on a grout colour for a particular piece, make a small sample using the same materials, perhaps on a scrap of board or the back of a tile, and try grouting different sections with different grouts to see how they work. I have done this even with grey grout, to decide how dark I would like it, gradually adding grey grout to white, or black to grey.

 

Also, experiment with just using one colour of shards and try different grouts all over or on different parts of the mosaic. You can get some good results using bright coloured grout with just plain white crockery. A dense colour may stain any scratches of crazing in the glaze, which can be an interesting effect.

 

Can you recommend any good books on the subject?

There are lots of books out there, but I particularly recommend "Making Mosaics" by Leslie Dierks. It was the first mosaic book I had, a few years ago, and it got me going!

 

I'm a big fan too of "Creating with Concrete" by Sherri Warner Hunter as an excellent source about cement-based materials: The book is currently being reissued in a new edition called "Making Concrete Garden Ornaments"

 

Also very good and full of pique assiette projects is "Mosaics" by Kaffee Fassett and Candace Bahouth.

 

Nobody should ever have to be without a copy of "Fantasy Worlds" by Deidi von Schaewen and John Maizels. It has glorious pictures of visionary environments built by outsider artists in Europe, the USA and elsewhere in the world. It's surely one of the most worthwhile books ever produced by the human race. I adore this book!

 

How do you keep the final level of a piece flat when using different

types of china, etc.? I attempted a small serving tray, but I can't carry anything on it - everything wobbles.

 

Mostly, you can't keep it level, I'm afraid. For my coffee table I put in some plate bases for standing things on. Generally if you use a lot of small pieces of roughly the same thickness, and nothing too curved, the plates and mugs will sit reasonable flat. The alternative could be to use pieces of tile all of the same thickness.

 

I want to do a large floor mosaic under a rustic arbour and seat . I've

collected a few tiles, but can I use shards on the ground?

 

I can see 3 ways of going about it. One would be to lay a concrete area and press the shards into it while it's still wet. Alternatively you could cast your own paving stones, using the "indirect method". The principle is he same as I used to make my garden owl, but using a square wooden frame and a flat surface. The easiest solution would be to use standard ready-made paving stones and mosaic onto them, using cement mortar (3 parts cement to 1 part sand) as an adhesive (a little blob under each piece) and then grout when dry with cement mortar (which could be coloured if you wish).

 

Some tiles and crockery shards can stand up to being underfoot out of doors, but it might depend on the amount of frost where you live and the quality of the materials - softer, cheaper crockery or tiles may chip underfoot if there's a lot of wear, or be prone to frost damage in winter.

 

I'm terrible at drawing - stick people are my specialty. I've heard there

are computer programs that can help with design and layout of mosaics.

 

I tend to use tracings of images, to make up for my lack of drawing skill. You can scale up the size with an enlarging photocopier, or using the scaling technique described here (where you'll also find notes on software).

 

I have recently started mosaics and I am having a difficult time finding interesting china pieces. Any suggestions?

 

Try jumble sales, car boot sales, charity/thrift shops. Ask all your friends and family to keep things they break. You could even ask at crockery shops if they have any breakages!! I used to do some voluntary work for a charity shop and I was allowed to keep crockery which was donated broken or was generally unsaleable.

 

I've been trying to get up enough courage to touch and inhale mastic

bond. This has been a major deterent for me in beginning pique assiette. I was interested to read your reference to plain household glue, in relation to the house number plate project, which was to go outside?

 

The glue I use for most of my projects is PVA glue. I think it's called white craft glue in the USA. There is a water-soluble version, which I avoid (this is what they prefer to use in schools because it washes out of clothes). Instead I get mine from a builders' merchants - but craft shops and DIY stores also sell the stuff. For the house number I used a waterproof PVA (sold for exterior woodwork uses) on weather-proof board. You might want to seek local advice for outdoor materials, depending on your climate

 

I think I understand the indirect method of gluing the tiles to the

surface and then grouting, but how do you make mosiacs like vases and other irregular objects. I've heard that you put the grout down first and press them in - is that right?

 

Here's a quick lowdown on the "methods": Gluing the tiles to the surface and then grouting is actually the direct method. It's the one I use most, and is described in the house number plate project.

 

The indirect method involves sticking the pieces face down on a surface (e.g. paper, a flat sheet or a mould) using a water-soluble glue. When the glue has dried you fill in from the back with grout or cement. When that's set you soak off the glue on the front. Then you grout from the front (as with the direct method). This method is especially good for when you need a flat surface e.g. a stepping stone. I used a variation on this method for my garden owl and the hemispherical plant pots.

 

To mosaic 3D objects, such as the lamp bases and the planter  I use the direct method. I would tend to use a ready mixed tile adhesive or a cement mix (rather than PVA/white glue), because it's very sticky and grips quickly, allowing you to work faster. But whatever you use, you will have to allow for the effects of gravity e.g. by working on one section at a time. Also, ready mixed adhesive, being rather like putty, can fill in gaps behind curved pieces. I apply the adhesive to each piece at a time, and grout afterwards when everything has set. I almost never use the technique of putting down the grout and pressing pieces into it.

 

I mosaiced a round fibre glass table using a mosaic glue adhesive for the tiles. I then used grey grout with one tenth black oxide mixed together dry then added water applied it with squidgie. I ran out of grout so only did half the table next evening mixed the same up and applied it. I wiped off all the excess but it is very crumbly. Shall I put on more grout where it is crumbly or give it a coat of sealant such as Bondcrete or a slate sealer?

 

The best thing, if you can face it, would be to remove as much of the crumbly grout as possible, with wire or a brush (an old tooth brush might be useful). Then you can regrout. Possibly the cut edges of the tiles absorbed so much water that the grout wasn't very adhesive once you started spreading it over the tiles.....it can happen....if so, make the grout with a little bit more water, brush off grout which is starting to dry and re-wet it slightly. If you don't overdo it, this seems to work OK, even if it is bending the rules a bit.

 

What can I do to prevent small cracks in the grout?

(Am I putting too much water in the grout or have too thin a coat of grout?). What is the best adhesive/glue to use to attach the shards? What is the best way to color grout? (Does it hurt or weaken the grout to use latex paint to add color pigment?). When do you use sanded grout versus unsanded grout?

 

Grout, eh? Sometimes I think "can't mosaic with it - can't mosaic without it". It's really a lot of trial and error I think. I've got some tips on colouring grout in project 2. A lot of the US and UK terms for the compounds and ingredients seem to be confusingly different. I use PVA glue (white craft glue) as my adhesive of preference. Allowing grout to dry too quickly may cause shrinking, I think. Also don't leave the grout sitting around after you've mixed it - use at once. I use a grout which is formulated for wide joints (3-12 millimetres) for just about all my projects. I think it's sanded, but still quite fine and works OK for smaller joints too.

 

I have a lot of broken dishes that I have saved, hoping to someday

making an outdoor mosaic table. What material, besides broken dishes, do I need?

 

Outdoor projects are quite a bit more difficult, because everything has to be waterproof and perhaps frost resistant, depending where you live. You'll need to use a table which won't warp out of doors, so most wood is not suitable.Basically you can follow the method for the house number plate. Use a waterproof adhesive, or cement-base mortar, and a cement-based grout to withstand the elements. However, I'd suggest starting with a smaller project suitable for indoors as a way of building up to a more major one.

 

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