Sand and Cork

It's been a while since I last updated. I guess that's typical for people who start out with good intentions for blogging. I haven't done a great job photographing progress, but here's what I've got.

All of the 1/4" gaps between tiles, seats, columns, and platforms were planned to be filled with cork grout which is ground up cork and acrylic binder. It has the consistency and workability of oatmeal. It dries really slowly and isn't cheap so I'd always planned on using a 1/4" thick layer of cork with something else to fill the 1.75" beneath it. We ended up using sand (which was a great recommendation from one of the Howard S. Wright contractors) because it's inert and fluid enough to move if the tiles shift. We dumped 200 lbs of sand on the floor and swept it around until it was gone. Above is a picture after we got the sand in the gaps.

So after we got the sand in the cracks, we noticed that if vibrated, it would compact by about an 1/8". I didn't want it settling after we applied the cork, so we put down a blanket and stomped on the tiles for about 2 hours. We looked really ridulous. Many contractors came to watch and left shaking their heads. Above is Tyler stomping. I only had one blanket; so we had to share which made it look like we were performing some sort of ritual.

Then we spent a day and a half grouting the joints with cork which was really messy and made everything (temporarily) look like crap.