It’s here! The blog post you have been waiting for! Last month I updated my master bathroom flooring and all of you were intrigued to say the least!

Vinyl Peel and Stick Planks

Per your request, I am giving you a step by step detailed post on how and what I did to transform my ugly old beige tiles. If you want to see the before pictures in details, check out this post. Truthfully, I have struggled ever since moving in here whether or not to do a DIY transitional update for our bathroom.

Generally I am an all or nothing gal. Why spend pennies and waste it on a transitional project? However, the dated basic beige 12×12 tiles were just becoming more and more of an eye sore. The dirty grout lines and the ugly color was making me crazy. And with all the Spring refreshes in other parts of my home, it got me thinking. I definitely found myself on a mission to refresh my bathroom.

Budget on my mind

I’m excited to announce that this cost me about $82 for a 60 square foot space. How can you beat that? 

Several months ago I had come across these planks online. What deterred me from taking on this DIY was the fact that I thought it needed underlayment and grout. But when I went into Home Depot, a very knowledgable employee told me “Nope, you can tile over the tile floor and no grout necessary! You can just butt them up together tight.” Ok, right then and there my mind was made up.

Important Criteria

Like I mentioned before, there is a caveat for these peel and stick planks. If you simply want to lay these planks right over your existing tiles, the grout lines must be 1/4″ or less. If it is more, you will need to look into laying down a underlayment. It essentially is a pad to lay on top of the existing flooring.

You can also lay the tiles down with grout after you have prepared the underlayment. Really depends what look your are going for.

Step by Step Guide

So here is what you will need to do:

1. Clean your existing floor. I used Bona and it worked great.

2. Measure your space and purchase the planks. Start measuring your first plank by thirds. You want to stagger these tiles just like you would with real tiles.

Mr. Meticulous aka Travis double checked my initial measurements. I don’t blame him. He has far more patience than me so it was nice to get a double check.

After that, I took over and installed the floor all by myself.

3. Starting with your first row, lay down full planks. Then with the second row, start with 2/3 of a plank and lay down rest with full size planks. With third row, start with a 1/3 of a plank and so on.

Another piece of advice is to use a heat gun and “warm up” the tile before you lay it down. The idea is that it is heats up the glue and will stick to the existing flooring effectively. Of course, be careful not to over heat! I couldn’t find my heat gun so I used a hair dryer. That was not very useful. The heat was not strong enough.

To be honest, it stuck quite well without any heat treatment.

Tiling around Toilets

I will be honest, tiling around toilets is not a easy task. I toyed with the idea of not removing the toilet. However after much discussion with Travis, we decided it was “easier” to remove the toilet.  

As you can see, it was much easier to tile in straight edges rather than the torture of going around the toilet base.

Getting a new toilet seat and cover made a huge difference too!

Easy Peasy Flooring

I am so pleased to write all the details for you on this special DIY. Now when I come into the space, I don’t have a physical reaction of “ew” or “ughs” to that ugly 90s basic tile flooring. Currently I stride in with oohs and ahhs. The texture of the vinyl planks feel exactly like engineered wood. No exaggeration.

So many of you asked to hear the details and I hope today helps get you started on this incredibly stylish yet easy way to transform old flooring.

Happy day!

Anita

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