Bathroom update: the floor

Apparently the most popular tile for Italian bathrooms is a style that imitates the look of wooden boards--"finto legno" fake wood. At least two of the contractors we talked to during the estimate stage assumed that's what we would probably want, too. Here's the look:

Not our bathroom.

Maybe this seems glamorous to people here because wood floors are a rarity. All the houses and apartments we've been in have been tiled throughout, not just in the bathroom and kitchen.

But ceramic fake wood was both too Italian for us and not Italian enough. Instead we wanted terrazzo tiles, similar to most of the other floors in our apartment, but with a little more color.

Here's a closeup of the tile we chose. The color isn't exactly true (it's lighter in real life), but you get the idea.

Yesterday morning the muratore arrived with a tall, dark, handsome sidekick who was never introduced to us but appears to be the tile guy. After the two of them scraped down the newly laid cement floor and cut up some tiles, adding another layer of dust to our already grimy apartment, the tile guy set to work laying the terrazzo pavers.

By lunchtime the work was done. Now the cement holding the tiles will need to dry over the weekend. The blue nubs are spacers holding the tiles in place.

On Monday the floor will be grouted and we hope the wall tiles will start going up immediately thereafter. So far I like the way it's looking.