HEX CEILING
No, it’s not a witchy thing!
Years ago, I bought 3 packs of HONEFOSS mirror tiles from IKEA and tucked them in the basement for an as-yet-unthought-of project. I thought they’d be a killer bar backsplash or intimate grooming station for an imaginary living space that we had not yet realized. Fast forward to our major remodel: I was still turning the idea over in my head…where do those honeycomb tiles go!? We didn’t design a bar area (we used to own/operate a bar and maybe got it out of our system), and the kitchen backsplash is perfect understated glam already, black penny tiles with sparkly gold grout. I thought I would put it somewhere in the addition, but then I saw an image on Apartment Therapy that inspired me to turn to the 5th wall: the ceiling!
A designer in Chicago mounted the mirrors to her ceiling as a chandelier surround to stunning effect. (She also designed the chandelier!) I knew this would work in my house…we already had mirrored ceiling in the Disco Powder Room…and I loved how the window light would be reflected into the room. It looked like a DIY project, but with our 9.5 foot ceilings, I enlisted Jimbob to help. He had the right tools and was already here putting in baseboards etc.
First I selected a pattern I liked. The mirrors themselves are 3 different colors: gold, grey, and plain, so I took a minute to organize the colors for the most impact. The empty hole in the diagram I made was for the base of our kitchen chandelier. Then we unpacked the boxes and laid them out to get a feel for the reality of what we were about to do. Next, I numbered the diagram and taped corresponding numbers to the actual mirror pieces.
The first tile is the hardest one to place. Did we use lasers and rulers? No. We eyeballed it and used painter’s tape. The chandelier was in place, so we had a fixed point to set our course. We used mastic to glue it up there. (Mastic is a mortar-like adhesive that we had used for our bathroom ceiling). Jimbob had these great adjustable braces that we used to hold the tiles in place while they dried. That was a relief…I imagined holding them up there myself on the hottest day in June (last summer).
So, in a few hours the ceiling was lit. Sometimes I wish I’d bought a few more packs for bigger impact, but overall I love the unexpected thrill of glancing up there. Sometimes they look wet. Sometimes they reflect cooking chaos. They are just cool. If I ever get sick of them (doubtful), I’ll do a metallic or high gloss lacquer ceiling.
Welcome home from tour, Mike. There’s a surprise in the kitchen!
The kitchen is particularly hard for an amateur like me to document, but I think you can get a feel for the extreme drama going on in there. It’s inky, but light and highly reflective surfaces make for lots of eye candy.
Next post: DAVID COMES TO LIFE!