It all started with my guest bedroom, where I needed 10 plaster angels and I had moved from the place where there was I store where I could get one for $ 10.00. I was desperate and needed to find an affordable solution and found it on eBay, a vendor who sold molds. There was nothing to loose by trying and the rest is history, I got my 10 angles for about $ 10.00. total
Next came the lion heads. I needed 12 for my pool patio and every place I looked, they were $ 30-40 each. Again, back to the eBay vendor, and sure enough I found my lion head.
Every time I ordered something from that vendor, I would get an extra mold as a thank you gift for free. Every time I made something with concrete and molds, I would have some concrete left over and I would use it up by making the gift molds just to have samples and boy did that pay off. When I was finally ready to work on my kitchen backsplash, I had nice collection of samples to play with to come up with the design.
Here is what you need for your project:
Molds
Concrete, the kind without gravel and large rocks
and patience, as you probably will not have enough molds to make many tiles at the same time. I had 3 molds each for the type of the tile I used in my backsplash, so it took me about a month or little longer, to make enough for my project, making one set each day.
Once I had few tiles each, I took a photo of each type of tile and played in the photo editing software to come up with the backsplash design that I was happy with. I had many days to play around
While making my tiles, I had time to prepare the area for the backsplash. With my design, I did not want any outlets to interfere, so those got moved under the cabinets. Then the cement board, similar that is used in showers, was installed, so there was something solid to attach the tile to ,as the tile is heavier than regular tile.
Once I had enough tiles, the real fun started. I got to finally install the tile:
I used the same mix that is used to install ceramic tile, to install my cement tiles.
While the tile was being installed, I had to make up my mind what color I wanted the backsplash to be. I used some broken pieces to test all the acid stains I had, to see which one would work for this project the best.
In addition to moving light switches, we had some under cabinet lighting installed as well. This added some additional task lighting but also showcased the new backsplash.
Then on to staining and finally sealing with concrete sealer. Below photo has half just stained and half finished with sealer.
I stained the backsplash once it was all installed, including grout (same concrete) because I used one color for all the tiles and this made it simpler. If I would have decided to use multiple colors, I would have stained the tiles before installing. Sealed the tiles once before grouting, then grouted and sealed the whole project once more.
Here are some more finished project photos: