"What Were They Thinking Thursday??!!" - Shower Tile Borders

Apparently it has become popular to add a little border in your shower tile. I have even seen HGTV recommending this crazy idea! Let's face it, you can't afford to buy all the nice pretty expensive tile so instead of just wishing it luck in someone else's home, you buy a tiny strip of it and tack it up around the perimeter.

This does not look good! 

The first problem is that it cuts your shower in half visually and makes it look smaller.

 I don't even begin to guess what these people were thinking! Not only is the tiny border terrible but what the heck is that trim tile doing on the wall? Is it supposed to be a shelf?

 This is a great example of a small shower. Look how that horrible border cuts the shower in half. It would've been much better to just leave it off. 

The second problem is that they are under-scaled!

 Do I follow the line until I get to the prize at the end?

Beautiful shower but why did they ruin it with that ugly diagonal border? It would also look better with frameless glass but I know that stuff is pricey!

Again, another luxury shower ruined by badly placed border.

So what do you think? Am I just crazy to let this bother me or are you on my side? Well, let me show you some showers that got it right and you tell me which looks better, border or no border.

 When in doubt, stick with white! Let the walls be the color in the room. Paint is much cheaper than tile!

This is interesting. I think it works to put the mosaic there because it doesn't break up the shower, however  once you have your stuff up there you are probably not going to want to draw attention to your shampoo bottles! 

Very nice! But I could live without the white trim piece in the shower. I can see why they did it though because the tile is continuous from wainscot to shower. It would've looked better to leave that piece out of the shower and just stopped it where it intersects with the vertical piece. It is really under-scaled to be in the shower. Also, you can see that they had to cut the tile at the top of the shower. If they would've left off the trim piece they would've had more room for a full tile at the top.

 This is a great example of a tile trim piece being the correct scale. It is used to separate a wainscot with the rest of the shower and it works because it is the same tile, just installed differently. This keeps the color constant in the shower and doesn't really break it up visually. Adds interest without making the shower look smaller. 

 Here is a good example of using accent tile in the correct way. A detailed medallion looks great instead of just running a border around the perimeter.

 You could just always do the whole shower in mosaic! What do you think? Too much? If you do have a mosaic shower, make sure and keep the rest of the room very simple.

 Love this!

 This is a great kid's bathroom!!!

 Very pretty marble tile but what do you think about that border running over the shower curb? 

This is gorgeous! A great example of using mosaic tile on one wall in shower and then keeping the other walls neutral. I also love how they put the mosaic on the exterior of the shower curb and half wall.

 Wow, life's a beach in this bathroom! It makes me a little dizzy. The tile is definitely cool but everything else is just off the mark. The rugs, the towel bar interrupting the tile wall and the vanity mirror. 

So am I just too opinionated or do you agree that shower borders are horrible? Let me know what you think, we love getting comments!

~Jessica