I’ve never laid flooring before and though I never stray away from a home improvement project, I honestly had little expectations with it being sticky tiles, as well as my ability. BUT WOW!!! I am so happy I went for it. I originally planned to just do my laundry room floor where my pig resides, but I kept going because I was so impressed with how easy it is to install and how great it looked. I did a total of four adjoining rooms. My pig’s room was down to the sub-flooring, the other three rooms I laid over lament, and as a side note, the rooms transition nicely. I did use a divider between the rooms laid over lament and my pigs’ room. The more I installed the more I learned... I recommend using an additional spray adhesive. I used the orange bottle (I believe gorilla glue) and it makes a world of difference with the hold (and with a pig and dogs I wanted to make certain it wasn’t going to come up.) The longer you wait after spraying the backs of the tiles and the floor, the stronger the grab is. So make sure you line your two edges before pressing down, cause once it’s down, it’s down. The pattern is amazingly forgiving. My home is over 100 years old. Nothing is level or square. I was so worried when the pattern was slightly off but not off enough to try to cut (I’m horrible at cutting, but that may be because I only had a steak knife). When you are up close installing it, you think the slight imperfections in the pattern are going to ruin the whole project, but don’t stress, once done you won’t be able to notice. I even went back looking over the specific areas, and couldn’t identify them. If you line up the edges of the tile and bend into place (the size you need) then bend the opposite direction, the tile makes a clean break, no cutting needed. I learned to leave the backing on and bend into place vs laying the tile and attempting to cut the excess. The trickiest area being around the toilet. You’ll want to order extras for mess ups and well I’m certain you’ll find other areas to spruce up and install (closets or whatever). Once done, you’ll discover occasional spots where the glue from the backing made its way to the front of the tile. I spent a lot of unnecessary time scrubbing- rough sponge, dry eraser, etc... then I discovered if you put some oil on a paper towel, it comes right up (no scrubbing necessary). I was so angry, but relieved when I discovered this. I’ve attached pictures, so judge for yourself the appearance of my rookiness, but I can say, if you use the spray adhesive (just a light dusting on both surfaces nothing too extensive) this floor is amazingly sturdy. My pig roots at the flooring, which is why his room had only sub flooring, and the tile in his room is withstanding his big snout and hooves so far... but honestly I’m not even worried because if a tile gets damaged, I’ll just replace it. He also frequently spills his water and the water just sits on top, and hasn’t impacted the hold even slightly. One last perk, I had a solid color flooring (it was 30 years old and hideous) but I thought I would be cleaning this new floor more often, but I’m actually cleaning less! It somehow hides the day to day dirt, pet hair, etc... much better! I had to adjust to having pattern, but it totally brightened and transformed the spaces. I couldn’t be happier!! I did not notice any variations in pattern from box to box either, and I had 33 boxes!!! I went through 6 cans of adhesive.
