Choosing tile that installs well
Plenty of beautiful tile is difficult, expensive or occasionally impossible to install cleanly in a given room. Handmade zellige moves and varies. Some large-format porcelain needs a leveling system and a flatter floor than yours currently is. Thin polished marble telegraphs every imperfection behind it.
Knowing that before you order is worth more than any showroom advice, because it is the difference between a material choice and an expensive surprise.
Pattern, layout and grout
Where the pattern starts, which wall gets the full tiles, how the herringbone meets the door, whether the vertical stack lines up with the niche. These are decisions, and made deliberately they are what read as designer work.
Grout is the most underrated decision in the room. Matching grout makes a surface read as a single plane; contrasting grout turns the same tile into a graphic pattern. We hold samples against your tile in your room's actual light before you commit.
The details people forget
Niche size and placement so it fits real bottles and lands on a grout line. Bench height and slope. Edge treatment: metal profile, mitred edge or bullnose. Transitions to wood or carpet. Where the light hits the wall and what that does to a glossy tile.
Every one of these is cheap to decide and costly to change once the tile is on the wall.