We Got Tile!
A few days before leaving for vacation, we took a walk to a fantastic second-hand vendor called Antiguedades: El Mamey (located near San Sebastian on the corner of Calles 75 and 72). Impressively stocked, the place is a ramshackled treasure trove of furniture, old stone and building materials from Mérida’s colonial past. Always keen for a look, we fell in love with a stack of reclaimed terracotta tiles, probably manufactured a century or so ago in Marseilles, France.
As with many building materials used in houses of the time, these tiles were employed as ballast on ships sailing to Mérida as part of the international henequen trade. Upon arrival, the ballast (our fantastic tile) was generally dumped at the port before being salvaged for use in the city’s colonial building trade.
We have been hoping to reclaim old tiles for our house, but never did we image we would hit the jackpot. After a few hours picking through the large stack for the choice tiles, we had 1200 - enough for our kitchen floor.
Each tile has a rough, slightly-chipped patina on them that will make for a textured, non-slip surface underfoot. Reflecting the terracotta roof tiles overhead in our kitchen (also from the same company in Marseilles), our kitchen should take on a lot of character when completed.
Being reclaimed, the tiles are covered in mortar, which means we have many days of cleaning them up ahead of us. Lucky for us, the mortar is rich with lime, so a simple acid wash will do most of the grunt work for us.
