Split Face Tiles

Split face stone cladding tiles

Split face is the one finish in the range that involves no grinding at all. The block is split along its natural bed and the face it breaks with is the face you get — ridged, uneven, several millimetres of relief from one point to the next. Ours are mostly travertine, with limestone and marble alongside.

This is cladding rather than flooring, and it should be specified as such. The relief is what makes a chimney breast or a feature wall read as stone from the other side of a room, because raked light across it throws a shadow that a flat tile cannot produce. Two practical consequences: depth varies piece to piece so external corners need setting out with that in mind, and the surface cannot be wiped down — keep it away from anywhere that has to be cleaned.