Kitchen Island

[dave l and l]

measured a job awhile ago and i am going to tile it next week. 60 x 60 polished porcelain floor. when i visited last week the kitchen was starting to be installed. floor looks okay, not totally level. the plan was to tile floor then install kitchen island after , which make perfect sense, however contract manager and joiner decided to install island and then tell customer that they always tile round the islands rather than the logical thing,..
i kicked up a fuss to customer, but the joiner and builder are gone and they have told them its bolted down and glued so there aint no moving it.
not tiled round a large island on a slightly of level floor it seems to me like a right pain in the preverbial ..
any one here get the pleasure of doing this much ,. i have been tiling for 15 years and never had the pleasure

 

[bansko]

Dave, it doesn't matter that they installed the island, it's normally common practice on domestic jobs I've done ( not that I do many) There could be two or three in a large kitchen but if you set it out properly and take a bit of time then there shouldn't be a problem, if the floor isn't as level or flat as you would like then you may need to tweak a few joints here and there but you've been doing the job long enough it shouldn't be a problem. Good luck.

 

[mma]

Last time I tiled around an island it was out, so through my grout lines out. Keep checking. Didn't have a laser line then though!!

 

[Andy Allen]

Just make sure you keep everything square and use slow set adhesive so you can adjust the tiles round the island,

 

[Spare Tool]

Its like tiling round a window Dave, make a staff or keep measuring across under island, or dry lay around island, leave dry laid tiles down and lift and stick one at a time down, check floor levels and see which is highest n work from that...impossible to tile uphill

 

[Qwerty]

I have made a massive frame before using CLS timber to check the squareness & spacing around the island. For £10 in CLS it was a cheap, quick & easy way of checking everything stayed true so it all married up nicely.

 

[Old Mod]

Stop worrying to start with Dave!
Have you never tiled a whole ground floor with a staircase or something in the middle, where all rooms interconnect?
Or even something like two interconnecting rooms with a wall in between and a door at each end?
Principle is just the same.
You would take a line through both doors wouldn't you and meet at the other door at the other end.
Take two parralell lines, one either side of the island, and make sure you stay on them.
If the floor is out of level you should be latexing anyway, esp with polished porcelain.
It really isn't a big deal, unless you make it one!
You'll be fine, don't worry!

 

[dave l and l]

thanks for replies
i suppose i am worrying a bit over nothing, think the fact i had it in my head that is was just straight forward floor has annoyed me.. 18 grand kitchen and they have installed island before i tile makes no sense,,
the only reason it was installed is so they could get paid and walk away. no thought to next trade in,
time constraints are also one of the problems as i had allocated time for this . got a few jobs to finnish before christmas,, treating it like a window makes sense and slow set

 

[hmtiling]

slc, parallel lines, standard set and if the room allows you, just go round the island with full tiles and don't cut to it. this way you can adjust if running slightly out without wasting any time re-cutting.

 

[Unused Account 1]

Dry cut round the island,hope tiles are all same size ,good luck

 

[On one]

Yep,I've had the same thing done to me with 600x600's.....as the saying goes ''s**t flows downhill''
The thing is you tile round the island and sure as hell their island is not going to square with your tiling.so chances are the customer is going to make the kitchen fitters come back and move the island anyway.
Good builders(and there are some) would have foreseen this and ''looked out for you''

 

[dave l and l]

thats the way i look at it, a decent trade would have a bit more pride in ther work and come back once the tiles have been fitted, he said to customer that the island would be too heavy for tiles , that made me laugh,
he was fitting engineered wood in other room which is open plan with kitchen wonder if he would have put island up then put the wood down eh.
i have avoided popping out to job till tomorrow as the joiners are still there , and i know it will develop into an argument if we are all on site. hopefully i have the place to myself tomorrow ..

 

[dave l and l]

arrived on job this morning, had a check of floor which was ok, then joiners arrived . turns out they are there for another week, so they easily could have left island out.
anyway they were still working in kitchen so i decided to leave job for a couple of day and go finish a couple of other jobs, annoying that they never let me know that they were going to be there, place was like a bomb site

 

[Saltire69]

should've told them the kitchen was outta bounds for them and started to tile floor m8, then when they moan you just say well should've left the island out .