Hexagonal Mosaic Shower Surround, Oakland Hills, September, 2026

This shower in the Oakland Hills got a hexagonal mosaic surround running from the pan to the ceiling.

The base was a standard black fiberglass shower pan that was already well mounted, so the work started at the walls. They were DensShield, which still needs a waterproofing layer before tile, so I sealed the backer to make sure the walls behind the mosaic stay dry. I also installed Schluter edging to give the exposed edges a clean, durable finish.

Before committing to a layout, I put up several mock-ups so the client could see the options on the actual wall rather than imagine them from a sample. The bottom two photos in the gallery show those mock-ups. In the end, he chose the hexagonal tile, running all the way from the pan to the ceiling. Where the tile meets the fiberglass pan, the joint gets a flexible, color-matched caulk rather than grout, so it can move without cracking.

For grout, the client chose Prism in charcoal, a sanded grout. It came out lighter than expected. Grout color in the bag and on the sample card often isn’t what you get on the wall, and with a mosaic, there’s so much grout that a small shift in color changes the whole look. The client still has an easy option: a grout colorant can be applied to darken the joints to the shade he had in mind, then sealed.

The floor, which also has a hexagonal pattern, was grouted with Polyblend charcoal unsanded grout, and it came out much darker. The same color name from two different products, on a similar pattern, gave two noticeably different results. It’s a good reminder to test grout on a board first when the exact shade matters, especially on a mosaic, where grout makes up so much of what you see.