THE MAKING OF THE TOPPS TILES MOSAIC TREE

by Concetta Pert Glittering Shards Mosaics

THE CONCEPT
The mosaic was commissioned to celebrate 50 years of Topps Tiles plc. The tree represents history, growth and the relationship between the centre and branches. The 326 leaves each represent a branch of Topps Tiles. The mosaic celebrates the beauty of the materials, the tiles that are the core business of the company.

As with much of my work, recycling plaid a large element. Many of the tiles were old Topps stock destined for landll. Not only did this allow us to incorporate history into the mosaic by using tiles from the 70s, 80s and 90s, it also illustrates one of the magical qualities of mosaic - that things that are considered rubbish can be turned into a thing of great beauty.

THE PROCESS

As soon as I was given the commission, I had a clear image in my head of what kind of tree this would be - bold and together but with whisps of branches coming out. The challenge was tting 326 leaves into the whole!

The design was then scaled up onto a full size sheet of paper, using an OHP in my daughters darkened bedroom (she wanted us to leave the drawing in her room!)

We used the old school trick of a thick pencil mark on the back of the image and then pressing hard with a pencil to transfer the image to its nal base - which is a special, light board called Wedi. We cemented 3 sheets of Wedi together to make the panel.

A special steel frame was commissioned and the wedi board glued and bolted into it. Finally it is time to start sticking mosaic pieces!

We organised our tiles by colour and broke them with tile nippers and the traditional hammer and hardie. Each leaf was made asa separ ate piece , which would later allow us to move them around,play with colour balance, texture and 3d effects.

The tiles - a mix of ceramic, vitreous tiles and coloured mirrors were hand cut and placed close together onto cement adhesive. When dry, the cement was peeled off the plastic leaving individually for med leaves. We made some of the leaves concave, some convex and some at.

In the centre of each leaf I wrote the name of each store 326 in total.

We placed the leaves and moved them many times to get the right balance of colour and proportion.

The amazing texture of this mosaic was created by the way we stuck the leaves - we used the cement to build some leaves higher than others and to tilt them left, right, up and down. This makes the whole piece move!

Working on such a large scale means that you cannot get the real perspective until the piece is raised vertical. I kept checking the perspective from a rst oor window and against a vertical axis.

The next part required a LOT of patience, as we lled in the gaps between the leaves with green ceramic. It was very ddly due to the height of the leaves - we were working cement and tiny shards of tile into small spaces - challenging and VERY time intensive.

The trunk and branches were made with large and small pieces angled with cement with some tiny irridescent shards embedded.

The ground was made with stones from my allotment...

...and the hedgehog was made by embedding thin strips of ceramic tile in cement adhesive...spiky!

This picture shows the reality behind the glamour of being an artist and a mum!

Next the background - pale blue with shades of grey getting lighter as you go upwards...

...and in the sky a mix of irridescent pink, white and blue mixed in with the ceramic tile.

The whole of the background only was grouted. This is a long process as there are many grout lines and different height tiles. The clean up took several days.

The whole mosaic was checked for sharp edges and these were sanded down.

Finally, after 6 weeks of work, the whole mosaic was lifted vertically, with a lot of help from lovely neighbours! This was a great moment - we got to see the mosaic in its glory for the rst time.

The big clean up - removing all the tiny loose shards in the mosaic, cleaning cement residue and polishing.

THE FINISHED MOSAIC

The nished tree 92 working days from concept to nish 1000s of hand cut pieces...

THE UNVEILING(S)!

Thanking my wonderful team of helpers - Michela, Doina and Izabela (not pictured)

At Topps Tiles HQ...