1930 Floor Tile Ideas

Color

• While the floor tiles during the 1930s displayed a wide variety of colors, the color tones had a strong tendency to be either muted or dimmed. For instance, rather than a bold red color, homeowners would have preferred a rustic burgundy color. Or instead of white and fluorescent green, shades of cream or olive green would have been favored. Floor tiles were not necessarily monotone. Often, a variety of complementary colors were placed together on the same tile to produce an intricate pattern.

Pattern

• Floor tiles from the 1930s had two main influences: a cultural influence by way of France and a popular design trend known as art deco. The French style is characterized as having feminine curves with patterns resembling an ornate flower. The art deco style is characterized as being geometric, symmetrical and modern with sharp edges, as opposed to the flowing lines characteristic of the French style. In some cases, a combination of the two may be found, with the presence of geometric curves.

Material

• While some of the more modern tiles are currently composed from stone, marble or clay, during the 1930s, ceramic tiles were the most popular and possibly the only type of tile available. A popular type of ceramic tile was encaustic tile, a decorative tile in which a stamp is firmly placed into the tile to cause an indentation of the surface. The indentation is then filled with clay of contrasting colors before it is left to dry. This process produces a colorful design that is inlaid directly into the tile's surface, as opposed to a painted or glazed surface.

Recycled Floor Tiles

• A budget-friendly way to acquire tiles from the 1930s era is to visit old bungalows from the same time frame that are scheduled for renovation. Speak with the owners about possibly taking the old floor tiles off their hands to use in your own home. Repeating this process with a few neighborhood bungalows will give you quite a collection of floor tiles, and you can be as creative as you like with them. For instance, you can combine complementary tiles to create a floor mosaic and use leftover tiles as a back-splash in the bathroom or kitchen.