What to put on the floor in a passive house?
I decided to tile all of the ground floor except for the separate living room ‘snug’ and then use large rugs in areas that I wanted to soften. Large format tiles look great in open plan spaces and also transmit heat really well so would allow the under floor heating to work very efficiently. There wouldn’t ever be an issue with a chilled tile in a passive house like you would normally get in a house in the UK.
Ground floor tiles
The tiles on the ground floor living area, hall, dining and kitchen area a porcelain 1000 x 500 x 10mm tile. These were fully bonded to the concrete slab with a flexible adhesive, leaving a narrow grout joint line which was grouted to match the tile colour. I checked over the slab with a laser and it was within +- 5mm, so the tiler did not have to use much extra adhesive or levelling compound.
Walk in shower area with heat mat cables
Latex levelling screed over ufh matt
Boys bathroom – This was to be tiled full height in the walk in shower and behind the twin basins. A recessed mirror cabinet was fitted into a recess formed in a partition wall behind the basins in the vain hope this would help my kids to keep the bathroom uncluttered.
Flush bathroom cabinet
Master ensuite – Partition walls were built to create an enclosure to fit a low level shower tray with a glazed panel and large hinge door. The 1000 x 500mm tiles were fitted over a ufh heat matt and up to the edge of the tray to create a small lip threshold.
Shower area with recess
Cutting tiles for wet room floor. I bought several 1000 x 1000mm tiles for the shower tray area so the minimum number of cuts could be made to create the falls. The shower tray area was formed using a Wedi system which is a tapered foam board with an integrated drain that you then tile over.
Ground floor wet room. A recess was cast into the slab for the falls for the drain and also to fit the soil riser and drainage. A custom foam tray was used that had the required falls in it and also integrated drainage. This was then tiled over with cut 1000 x 1000mm tiles so there would be the minimum possible number of cuts. The rest of the bathroom floor was 1000 x 500 mm tiles, all with a textured finish to give a good slip rating.