Pavement Tiles for Courtyard – Which ones are the best?

When you see courtyard and surroundings of a home from outside you can guess the nature of its living members, their tastes, and to some extent their mental status and style of living. If happiness prevails at home, it’s well shown in the courtyard. If you are unrest in life going through some sort of family problems, financial issues or others, you may pay less interest in keeping your house and courtyard neat and tidy because such things may not be accounted among your top priorities. Let us leave all those life problems behind and keep our courtyard and front side of our home neat and stylish so that guests may feel comfortable while they visit us.

When it comes to welcoming guests and showing hospitability, the appearance of our home and surroundings play an important role. Why can’t you try with new experiments for tiles in courtyard? We are living in a world where marble, granite and tiles are used not only for our interior, but for exteriors too. Pavement tiles of different types are trending now. I have earlier discussed about wall cladding. Click on this link to know more.

As tiles in the exterior are most exposed to sunlight and rain, to retain its colour, shade and brightness we should look into certain factors while selecting tiles for floors, outer walls etc. Cost can also play an important game, and it adds maintenance cost and frequent cleaning as well taking so much of your precious time and money. Through this column I shall briefly explain a few types of tiles giving importance to beauty as well as safety.

Natural sandstone

In terms of looks and quality, no other pavement tile can beat natural sandstone. It’s the top choice among outdoor materials in India. It suits all climatic conditions, that’s the reason why. Also, as time passes by, it turns more attractive giving an elegant look to your outdoor. It can also withstand the passing of heavy vehicles. The only defect is – non-resistant to stains. Its surface has pores and for the same reason if comes into contact with chemicals, stains or grease it’s not easy to remove it completely. While using sandstones reassure that stone’s surface is perfectly sealed. Otherwise it gets stains easily.

Wooden deck flooring

Beauty of wood and durability of wooden deck flooring made it one of the leading tile types in present market. It is available in different size and designs. Artificial wood is used in this case. As they are made using bamboo, poly ethylene and chemical additives, recycling is possible. Contact with water won’t damage this tile and hence it stays beautiful for a long time. Wood used for your courtyard is not polished. As the surface is rough, you won’t skid easily. You can experiment wooden deck flooring in the garden as well as area around swimming pool. Its starting rate is 250 rupees per square feet.

Flamed Granite

Flamed Granite is among the top quality tiles available in market right now. They are processed from normal granites by exposing them to fire and heat in good strength, thus making crystals of granites more visible and texture of surface also thickens. Advantages are double fold. It’s easy to drive vehicles in the courtyard and tyres won’t affect or make marks on the surface of tiles. They are most found in dim and blurred shades, which is fashionable and elegant. Their rough patches on the surfaces also prevent from skidding. They are durable than brick and concrete pavements.

Main drawback is they are easily attacked from mud and dirt, which gives a feeling that tiles are old. So frequent cleaning is necessary. Take ¼ cup isopropyl alcohol and three drops of dish washing soap to prepare cleaning mixture and clean the tiles frequently. You can fill this solution in a sprayer, spray on the floor and wash using water. Starting rate of this tile is 130 rupees per square feet.

Tiles with grass infill

They are eco-friendly with half portion tiles and the second half portion with green grass. In short tiles are fixed in uniform pattern in green courtyard making it everyone’s favourite. If you love gardens and landscapes, this style is best one for you. Though this tile work for courtyard gives coolness to eyes, it’s difficult to maintain. Frequent watering is needed, grass is to be trimmed at regular intervals and weeds should be removed also. You can also choose buffalo grass quite seen in countryside, which requires less maintenance.

Concrete or stone tiles are mostly preferred in this case. Tiles are spread with at least 1.25 cm gap between. After this process, the gaps can be filled with soil of good quality. You can either sow seeds or plant grass saplings in the soil. Till grass plants grow up, never drive vehicles on its top. Proper drainage is essentially needed in this case. Otherwise the monsoon season may fully ruin its beauty. The whole space may be filled with water if proper space is not provided for water to flow. Its square feet rate is 65 rupees.

Turf paver

They are best to keep your courtyard safe and strength. It’s an open style paver and hollow pavers used for the construction of permeable pavements. Holes found in this style are very close to each other. The holes can be filled with grass or gravel. If you fix grass, it’s very beautiful and comfortable to walk. Otherwise it’s difficult to walk bare footed, but maintenance is low. It can prevent soil erosion and hence best suited for sloppy areas. Rainwater can be effectively sent to ground through this method. This eco-friendly type of pavement tile is cost effective too, starting with 30 rupees per square feet.

You can either trim grass or allow it to grow in full freedom, thus experimenting with different styles. Otherwise fill your courtyard with different types and colours of gravels. In the driveways it’s better to fill gravels. Those areas through which vehicle wheels pass frequently, grass fillers will get easily damaged and thus kills the beauty of your exterior.

Kota Stone Flooring

Beauty in low budget – that’s the main advantage of Kota Stone Flooring. It’s readily available in brown, black and green shades. Its surface prevents easy skidding, and the material is thick with density. As they are free of pores, it’s less exposed to fungal attack and moss. They can be spread in areas with moisture content without any fear. But the main disadvantage is – you can’t use acid or alkali to clean its surface in the case of stains. As it belongs to limestone type, exposure to both these can easily damage the floor. You can’t buy it as slabs similar to marble or granite. It costs 17-20 rupees per square feet.

Terrazzo

Its durability is high and well suits almost all construction structures. This floor pattern can be customized as per user needs, and is a mixture of colouring agents and stone chips. Once the pattern is done, it’s allowed to set. Later continuous polishing is needed to make its surface well finished and shinning. You can experiment multi colours with same or different floor patterns on floors till you get desired one. Flexible metal divider strips are used in concrete floors as joints for this purpose. Terrazzo mixtures can be mixed with different colours to get patterns of our choice.

Brick paver

This eco-friendly paver is made using natural clay. They are kin baked before used as tiles. So they are less harmful to nature. They help in the inflow of rain water to earth and also give a classic look. It’s best suited for the paver which guides a visitor from front gate to the sit-out. As bricks are not thick, they may break easily. This problem can be solved by giving supporting to the tiles by concrete edging and cement mortar. It costs 10 rupees per square feet.

Concrete Paver Block

Concrete is the main ingredient of paver back. It has less maintanence cost and is available in different shades and designs. Its surface has excellent drainage facilities thus sending rain water easily to ground through gaps and joints. Thus water won’t fill your courtyard even during heavy monsoons. They should be evenly spread in the ground level. Otherwise weeds and grass can easily fill the space in between. It can damage the blocks. Price of a single block starts from 12 rupees.