Checkered Tile Coffee Table
Disclosure: This blog contains affiliate links. I will receive a commission for items purchased through these links at no extra cost to you. I appreciate your support. Please read all labels and follow all manufacturer safety recommendations when working with paints, stains, and other equipment.
Supplies Needed
Tile - I got mine at the Habitat for Humanity Restore
Grout - I used leftovers from another project but I suggest pre-mixed!
Tile Spacers - There are tons of size options to fit your style.
Why?
I often get asked, “how do I get started with DIY projects?” and my answer is always the same, “DO A FURNITURE FLIP!”
WHY?
You can often get the piece of furniture for free or really cheap on Facebook Marketplace, and then use it as a low-stakes project to practice your skills before moving into the house! If you mess up…..who cares?!?! it was a free piece of furniture and you can just get rid of it! If you had practiced those skills in your house and messed up then you are stuck with that problem until you fix it haha
SOOOO for this project I really wanted to practice my tile skills. I want to re-do my bathroom in the near future and saw this project as a great opportunity to refresh myself on all things tile!
Finding the materials
A great place to find pieces of furniture to flip is Facebook Marketplace, but honestly sometimes I just don’t to deal with scrolling for good pieces and messaging strangers about them LOL
Recently, I’ve been doing a lot of my furniture flip shopping at the Habitat for Humanity Restore. The best part of shopping here is their profits go back to the Habitat for Humanity charity projects! The worst part is that you never know what you will find, but that’s also kind of fun ;)
This time I hit the jackpot! I found this Pottery Barn Kids Play Table that was solid wood and had been marked down multiple times because no one was buying it. It was pretty beat up (and chewed?) so I think that’s probably why it wasn’t flying off the shelves. I loved that the table was so simple in its’ design. It was a great base to add some flare to.
Habitat for Humanity sells all kind of building materials. Everything from doors, bathtubs, paint, and TILE! Most everything in their store has been donated so it’s kind of hard to know exactly what they will have, but the day I got there they must have re-stocked on a huge tile order. Seriously, I’ve never seen that much tile!
I found these boxes of small squares and rectangle tiles and immediately knew I could easily combine those with my simple little coffee table! The wheels in my mind were spiiinnniiinnnggggg.
Prep
As soon as I got the table home I broke it LOL. I tried moving it and put too much weight on one of the legs and it completely ripped out of the table (level 3 mozzarella). That ultimately led to me just taking the whole thing apart haha
In order to get rid of the chew marks and some general dents and dings I sanded the whole piece down with 80 grit sandpaper. This easily removed all of the stain, and then I went back with 220 grit sandpaper to get everything super smooth before staining.
Before staining, it is super important to get all the dust off of your piece. I recommend using a tack cloth it is a slightly sticky rag that removes all the microscopic dust particles you can’t get off with a regular rag.
Stain & Seal
I loved the grain pattern of this table and I wanted to preserve that as much as possible by choosing a lighter stain. I used Early American which is currently my all time favorite stain color! It’s a perfect medium tone that gives a little more oomph to the wood without covering up the grain!
Quick Staining 101:
Put on your gloves, stain is so annoying to wash off. Especially oil based stain.
Apply the stain with a foam brush. Go with the direction of the grain.
Let the stain sit on the wood for a couple minutes, the longer you let it sit the darker it will look. Usually 2-5min is good!
Do not let the stain dry on the wood before you wipe off the excess stain with a stain rag
Repeat as needed to get your desired color!
After staining it is really important to add a top coat to protect your piece of furniture. For this project I used a fast drying polyurethane. I chose the stain sheen because this coffee table will likely see a lot of action. Satin is not too shiny, but easy to wipe off spills, dirt, etc.
Here’s how I applied it.
Use a new foam brush and apply the poly in direction of the grain, try your best to avoid brushing the same spot multiple times to avoid brush lines.
Let the poly dry! Unlike stain you do not want to wipe off the extra.
After this coat dries it is likely the wood will feel rough to the touch (the grain is raising up because we added water to it with the poly). Lightly sand the piece down with 220 grit sandpaper to smooth everything out.
Apply your second coat and let it dry.
After this coat, use a 1500 grit sandpaper to smooth out any rough spots or brush marks.
Apply one last coat, let it dry, and you should be good to go!
Cutting the tile
I’ve been seeing so many checkered patterns showing up in rugs, blankets, furniture, etc. online and I thought this would be such a fun chance to put my spin on it!
The white tiles that I bought were already a square, but the green tiles I wanted to use were a long rectangle and needed to be cut down into squares.
A really common way to cut tiles is by using a wet saw. They are really easy to use but super messy so I decided to just use a little tile cutter! This tool works by scoring the top layer of the tile and snapping the tile in half.
Here’s how it works:
First identify where you want to make your cut.
Line the tile up so your cut line is in the middle of the tile cutter.
Then grab the handle and roll the wheel across the top of the tile. Only score the tile once, and go pretty quickly.
Flip the little black foot down on your cut line and press with the handle to snap the tile!
It’s easy! No power tools, no problem!
Attaching the tile
Something so fun is that I was able to partner with Loctite for this project to make a couple videos for Instagram and Tiktok. They asked me to use their PL Premium Max adhesive on a furniture flip, and I thought this project would be the perfect place to try it out! (they are not paying me to write this blog post, I just really like the product!)
It is a super strong construction adhesive that bonds to a ton of materials including wood and ceramic, aka PERFECT for this tile coffee table.
If you’ve ever used a hot glue gun before or done any type of caulking project then you can totally do this! After cutting off the tip of the glue, and poking a hole in the tip. You load the glue into your caulking gun.
I drew lines on the center of my table to help me line up my tiles when applying everything. You want to start putting tiles down in the middle of the table. That way if there are any small cuts you need to make, they will be on the outside edges.
I put a little drop of glue onto each corner of the tile, and then pressed down slightly once it was on the table to help the glue spread out underneath the tile. THAT’S IT! so easy right?!?!
I used tile spacers to help me keep the spacing consistent between all the tiles.
I let this dry overnight and let me tell you, this glue is STRONG. These tiles are not going anywhere! Normally when you are doing a tiling project you would use something called thin-set to attach your tiles to the wall or floor, but it in my experience it is so stinking messy haha Using this Loctite glue was so fast, clean, and cheap!
Grout
Now for the finishing touch….grout!
I used leftover grout from my kitchen backsplash and I’m glad it was white! It blends in so nicely with the white tiles and doesn’t take away from the checkered pattern.
Grouting 101:
Clean your tiles off.
Using a grout float press the grout into all the cracks. Don’t worry if it get’s onto the surface of the tiles, you can easily clean it off with water.
I let my grout sit for just a couple minutes so it could harden up a bit.
Grab a sponge and two buckets of water. One for clean water and one for dirty.
Get your sponge a little wet and start cleaning the tiles. Tip: Don’t have your sponge be too wet because it will start taking off too much grout!
Tada - Let it dry and you are done! If you need to do a second coat to fill in any gaps or bubbles, go for it!
It is probably a good idea to seal your tiles after applying all the grout! Especially if you are doing a table like me because there will likely be drinks or food that could spill and stain the grout.
TA-DA!
I’m really loving the final look of this piece!! It has so much energy and I just love the color of that green tile (maybe I’ll use it for my bathroom!)
Again, the best part of furniture flips is that if you absolutely hate the piece in the end you can sell it and never have to see it again haha but they are a great chance to practice your skills!
Need a visual? Check out my final reveal and tutorials in my story highlights on Instagram!
