Terrazzio Tiles vs. Terrazzo Flooring
At Terrazzio, we’ve taken an ancient art and brought it into a convenient and modern material with the same staying power and some real benefits over the traditional installation.
What Exactly is Terrazzo?
Terrazzo is a style of flooring material and a process for installation that has been used since ancient times for the sake of creating smooth, durable and elegantly diverse walking surfaces. The basic process of creating terrazzo, which remains practically the same to this very day, involved placing fragments of crushed marble or other stones and ceramic materials into a poured mortar floor base. These would then be allowed to cure and afterwards polished down to create an extremely durable, smooth surface that could resist penetration by moisture or mold for incredibly long periods of time.
Later, innovations such as the use of metal strips between terrazzo slabs to prevent fractures from thermal expansion and contraction, and the use of electric grinding tools made the process of installing these floors a little easier. It remained very time consuming, however, since creating a lovely, smooth poured terrazzo floor continues to require weeks of prep work, installation, curing, polishing and cleaning.
A more modern solution for terrazzo flooring, which incorporates prefabricated manufacturing and the same durability of ancient terrazzo had to be developed. The creation of this is what allowed these lovely floor installations to become far more affordable and easily installable.
The Terrazzio Tile Innovation
This is where Terrazzio (with an "i") comes into the picture. We’ve brought in a modern manufactured evolution to the time-honored process of terrazzo that's far easier to install while delivering a finished surface that's almost identically beautiful and long lasting. Terrazzio tiles are pre-cast in large formats that can range considerably but include dimensions such as 24"x 24", 48"x 48" or rectangular shapes such as 24"x 48" and larger.
The most useful thing about our terrazzo tiles instead of poured-in-place terrazzo is that these smoothly polished new tiles are created, cured and finely polished down well before they're delivered. Thus, instead of a slow organic process of pouring mortar filled with pieces of rock, letting it set and then polishing everything down finely, you can simply have fully finished, finely cut tiles set into mortar and ready to be walked on in just a few hours.
Terrazzio tiles offer the same material surface and production as the terrazzo flooring of antiquity, but in a far more modern form that's also extremely durable. These diverse tiles are manufactured right inside the United States and can be customized based on color, internal rock material, design and size depending on your needs and aesthetic desires. Our tiles can also be customized to match your project colors and designed to recreate your logo.
Because the size of each standard terrazzio tile is so large, they can be finely joined together to form a nearly uniform look that closely resembles the smooth floors of traditional terrazzo with its much higher labor costs. This is ideal for large commercial installations.
Additionally, our tiles are composed of 20% recycled materials, which can get you two LEED points if you’re working on your certification. And those builders within 500 miles of Loretto, TN may qualify for additional points as well.
If you'd like to experience the most modern possible version of terrazzo design without the laborious and time-consuming ancient pouring process, Terrazzio tiles are the answer. Contact Terrazzio for free samples, shipping details and cost calculations.