High drama. Julie Cavanaugh, founder and principal designer of Design Matters – which operates across five studio showrooms in Northern California; Jackson, Wyoming; and Park City, Utah – often use the phrase backsplash to connect to the drama. “The owner of this smaller ranch-style home in San Jose loves high style and lots of charm,” Cavanaugh says. “For this backsplash, we combined glass tiles in multiple sizes and textured natural stone. We toyed with the idea of ’soldier’ tile, which is a single row of vertical tiles on the countertop and a second tile or material on top of it.”
“Since this project required us to add more charm, we shifted the soldier tile horizontally to allow a few extra inches of the beautiful vertically designed stonework to take center stage,” she says. “Inserting a few glass tiles in the line of the countertop also helps with spills and cleanup, as they are not directly on the marble.”
“Since this project required us to add more charm, we shifted the soldier tile horizontally to allow a few extra inches of the beautiful vertically designed stonework to take center stage,” she says. “Inserting a few glass tiles in the line of the countertop also helps with spills and cleanup, as they are not directly on the marble.”