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If you add such a personalized form of art expression to your own home, it won't be long before an assignment from others will come your way, but I found it more profitable to promote sales and orders by keeping a list of people building new homes and approaching them personally with decorative tile ideas and prices. For tile work requiring the services of a tile setter, I find working with the tile contractor for the particular job a decided necessity.

My workshop and display is right in my home in Eureka, California, and my single tiles in the form of seasonal cards sell throughout the year. Greetings for Christmas, Easter, Mother's day, Father's day, birthdays (personalized) and other decorative forms such as figures, portraits, flowers, fruits, fish, birds and landscapes are on display. I get $2.25 each for tiles with a fired transfer pattern (ceramic decalcomania). I sell my original hand-painted Santa Claus tile at $3.95. My "Nativity Scene" is a more difficult painting and therefore I charge $8.95 for the single tile. I recently sold a series of six tiles with naturalistic fruit paintings to newlyweds for use in their kitchen tile work. These were $4.95 each.

There is only one practical technique of decorating and painting these tiles so the paintings will become permanent and a part of the ceramic glaze, thus being impervious to water, cleansers, alcohol and oils. I accomplish this with the proper use of ceramic overglazes on commercial tiles and fire them in a kiln. I obtain white commercial tiles from a local tile contractor and from a building and supply company. The costs of my commercial tiles before decorating and firing are thirty-five cents each but whenever I can buy in quantities of six dozen to a gross, I have received a twenty per cent discount. I am now working on a folder of designs showing colors and prices for display at a building and supply company and this should, lead to numerous orders.

HERE ARE the steps I follow in making my "Flower Garden" table top. The same steps are applicable in doing other designs.

STEP ONE: I make a rough sketch of the over-all pattern for the table top. Then, I draw a detailed outline of each section (tile) design in exact size on tracing paper. I use six tiles or sections for the Flower Garden project with a different flower pattern on each section. In order to bring the six sections together as a unit, I use the same color throughout in the background tint and design the border on each so in repeating on each tile I create an all-over border pattern which "ties" the different flowers together. I place the tracing outline (Figure shows the outline for the poppy tile in the Flower Garden top) in position on the tile with Scotch tape to hold the edges, leaving one side free. I then slide a sheet of graphite paper under the outline tracing and trace the design with a hard smooth point. I find an old ball-point pen ideal for tracing.

STEP TWO: Preparing paints. I pour a small mound of powdered overglaze color onto a palette (a small ground glass slab is my ideal palette), then add a few drops of oil medium. I mix this to a smooth consistency with the aid of a glass muller or palette knife. The paint should not be so thin that it will spread on the palette, nor should it be so thick that it will stand in a mound. Getting the happy medium consistency is quite important. There are many commercial oil mediums for overglaze painting and some painters use a French fat oil, others use a turpentine medium. I use my own compounded formula which contains oil of lavender, one part; oil of copaiba, ten parts; oil of cloves or anise, ¹/10 part.

STEP THREE: I mixed the following colors for use on the different sections or tiles:

FLOWER—LOCAL (term applied to color used for all-over tint)—SHADING (colors used in shaded areas)
1. Poppies—Yellow-red—Violet of iron
2. Wild Roses—Rose color—American beauty and rose pompadour
3. Daisies—Albert yellow—Yellow-brown
4. Violets—Banding blue and violet—Ruby-purple
5. Pansies—Violet and pansy purple—Ruby-purple and black
6. Daises and clover—Tile is left white for daisies Pompadour red for clover—Copenhagen gray Ruby-purple
Foliage (All leaves, buds)—Moss green and apple green—Gray green, shading green and dark green
Background tint (for all tiles)—Shading green
Border (Forget-me-nots)—Baby blue—Sevres blue
CENTERS
Poppies—dark green pod with black and violet stamens.
Wild Roses—apple green heart, yellow center and violet of iron stamens.
Daises—dark brown
Violets and Pansies—yellow with black markings.
Forget-me-not—yellow and yellow-red.

In painting a major project such as the "Flower Garden," I find making a color treatment chart before mixing colors and painting, facilitates the work and I have a record should I want to duplicate a tile.

STEP FOUR: The brushes I used on this project are soft camel's hair quill brushes called a No. 1 pointed, a No. 4 square shader, a No. 6 square shader and a No. 6 stippler brush. I work a little of the oil medium into the brush before picking up the prepared paint. With the No. 4 square shader, I pick up some of the shading green (which is the background tint) and paint it in a circular area around and in between the flower and foliage spaces. In order to get a cloudy effect and to break the brush lines, I go over this wet paint with my No. 6 stippler brush, using it in an up and down pouncing manner. I stipple the outer edges of the circular area several times, thus subduing the color until it is very light. As I want my flower and leaves to appear over and out from the background, my outline edges must be sharp and clean to receive the purity of the flower and leaf colors. I clean any smudges from the stippling process by wiping with a stick point wrapped in cotton.

I paint the leaves and stems next, using the local greens (moss and apple) first and then shading in the shadow areas with the various shading colors for foliage. I use the No. 4 and No. 6 square shaders for this painting. I use the No. 1 pointed brush to line the vein markings in the leaves and for stem work, using the dark green color. A little violet of iron (a light red-brown shade) on the wild rose stems is effective. With the small stick point, I pick out a few highlights on the leaves. (This is cleaning off a small spot so the white of the tile shows.)

My next action is to paint each petal of the flower, using the brush best suited for size and covering with the "local" color. In the poppy section, I cover with yellow-red, using the No. 6 square shader. With a smaller brush, I paint violet of iron in the shadow areas, I like the No. 1 pointed brush for fine detail in painting the flower centers. I am careful with the black touches used in the poppies, pansies and sometimes violet centers, as too little black is better than too much. Progressing to the forget-me-not border design, I paint in the same manner as the other flowers and leaves. By painting all the central areas first, I prevent any smearing of a wet border painting. I clean brushes in turpentine after painting.

Obtaining the best quality supplies, my initial costs in order to paint the Flower Garden table top were $14. These supplies are sufficient for large number of other tile paintings, with new tiles being the only additional supply needed. I get powdered overglaze colors in vials at twenty-five to thirty cents each, excepting the violet, purples and gray which are more expensive. At the present I pay sixty to eighty-five cents for each vial of these colors. The overglazes having gold, silver, uranium and platinum oxides in their composition are always higher in price. My initial cost for a long supply of oils is $1.50 and the set of four brushes came to $2.50. The value of my Flower Garden table top is $36 in loose form. If I were to include any wood frame or table parts, I would have to adjust my price accordingly.

STEP FIVE: After completing all six paintings, I keep the tiles free of dust and lint until thoroughly dry and then give them a kiln firing. For painters not experienced in the art of firing ceramic bodies, I have a firing service. The fee is small, with ten cents each on small tiles and twenty-five cents each on larger tiles.

As kilns differ as to the length of time required to reach a certain temperature, no one can fire by a set time. As there are various types of ceramic tile bodies (original clay compositions in terms of a potter's analysis are called soft, medium and hard bodies) with their "fitted" glazes (glazes to match the type of clay body), the colored overglaze paints used to decorate require different temperatures. Soft bodied tiles are American made and standard for all tile work. Hard bodied tiles are more difficult to obtain as they are imported from Germany and France.

I use the standard tiles (soft) giving them an overglaze firing to 720 degrees centigrade (or 1,328 degrees Fahrenheit) which takes about three hours and fifty-five minutes. I use a pyrometric cone which is placed inside the kiln so it can be seen through the peephole. These cones bend over and start to melt at various temperatures. I choose the cone for the temperature wanted. I have used a pyrometer, a temperature gauge attached to the kiln which records all degrees of temperatures that the inside of the kiln reaches. When the kiln reaches the desired temperature, I turn it off and leave it untouched until the next day. I find this procedure will give the tiles a slow cooling off period and prevents breakage due to sudden temperature changes.

STEP SIX: After firing, the naturalistic "Flower Garden" arrangement called for a second painting session because I wanted the daisies a brighter yellow, the pansy faces darker, a stronger red on the clover and the shading color deeper on the wild roses. I touched up all of the centers and strengthened the shadows in the leaves with dark green. This step is merely repainting an area using the same colors used in the first painting. All truly naturalistic presentations require this second painting to obtain real depth and form. Always remember that the paint is applied in these even brush strokes, using the largest brush possible for easy handling. I make it a rule to make one stroke do the work of two.

STEP SEVEN: After the tiles are dry, I fire them in the kiln in the same manner as in Step Five.

ANOTHER PROJECT I have finished is a landscape called "Redwood Grove" which will become a wall mural. It contains six tiles, six inches square, and has been sold for $60 as a result of being exhibited at a local fair. I find shows, fairs and other events that give me an opportunity to display and exhibit the best means of approaching the general public.