Wall Tile Mural, How To Hang It?

[DMCosta]

I am about to create a 9 piece tile wall mural that will be hung on a wall as individual pieces. The tiles will be about 8 x 10 in size and not excessively heavy. I have experience making tiles but never needed them to securely hang on a wall. Any suggestions on what I need to do to the back of the tiles to make them able to be hung securely? The 9 piece set will not be on the wall permanently.

 

I appreciate any suggestions!

[Stellaria]

Can they be made with holes in the corners to link the tiles together in columns and hang each column with chain?

[Marcia Selsor]

You could cement them to a finished board and mount that to the wall.

 

marcia

[JLowes]

I have made several tile murals about the size of one of your tiles.  I mounted them with construction adhesive to 1/4" luan plywood that I cut just smaller than the tile and painted flat black.  Before mounting I drilled a pair of holes for countersunk screws and picture hangers to allow picture wire to be used.  That was a lot of work, but made a secure, movable mounting, and with the picture wire I had some flexibility in adjusting the hang.  I have also tried the sawtooth type picture hanger screwed to the plywood, but the mural can sometimes not seek to a level and plumb hang, and getting several tiles parallel and perpendicular to each other could be challenging.

 

For a larger installation, I have mounted the tiles to plywood and used a cleat system for the wall mounting, nice and secure.

See:  http://www.govart.com/hardware_cleat.html

 

Since you are going to be mounting several in rows and columns, I presume, you might wish to design the tile with hanging capability built in. This could be via creating a retaining depression in the back, or a slipped, scored, and joined hanger bit, so that a screw, nail, or picture hanger could be used.  The problem with built in is adjusting would need to be done by the mounting hardware.

 

CAD had an overview here:

 

http://ceramicartsdaily.org/ceramic-art-and-artists/ceramic-sculpture/clay-on-the-wall-an-introduction-to-hanging-ceramic-wall-pieces/

 

Lots of solutions, but hard to pick.  Each has plusses and minuses.

 

John

[Colby Charpentier]

John's cleat system is probably the best option. The prices on those aluminum cleats are pretty reasonable. If you'd prefer to make them yourself, a standard wooden cleat will work fine. Pre-mounting tile has always been unattractive to me. It either says that you didn't make the original work to spec, or you didn't have access to a large enough kiln...

[jrgpots]

Will the tiles be flush (side by side) or will they be layered making a 3 dimentional piece?

 

If they are side by side, do you plan to grout between the tiles? Flush mounting with or without grout would lend itself to glueing or setting with quick set mortor to a backboard as metioned above. The 3D version would lend itself to using a metal framework to which the tiles would be secured.

 

Of course you need to let us see you finished project.

 

Jed

[DMCosta]

Thank you everyone, all the advice was great!

 

Jed, the tiles will be arranged side by side with a few inch gap from one tile to the next. Each in theory as it's own individual hanging piece.

 

John, the advice and ceramic arts article were extremely helpful, I liked the idea of making clay lugs on the back of each piece that can be wired individually.