Valencia Honed Traverten Hexagon Mosaic Tiles

Honing grinds the face level and stops short of polishing, so the surface stays matte but keeps a sawn edge. On travertine that has a consequence which does not arise on marble. Travertine forms around mineral springs and sets with gas cavities running through it; a honed face cuts straight through those cavities and leaves them as clean-rimmed openings in an otherwise flat plane. The stone reads as smooth and pitted at once. Tumbling, by contrast, rolls the edge of every void until the whole surface is uniformly broken.

Which is right depends on the room. A honed face holds the Valencia palette of caramel, terracotta and warm sand at full strength and shows the linear banding clearly, because a level plane reflects evenly. It also gives a crisper joint line, so the honeycomb geometry is sharper than in the tumbled version.

The cavities are the thing to plan for. Some are filled at the factory and some are not, and an unfilled one will take up grout during installation unless the sheet has been sealed first. Grout sitting inside an open pore is very difficult to remove later. Seal, grout, then seal again. Suits bathroom walls, floors and splashbacks.