Six stages, and the first three are the ones that decide whether the finished mural is worth looking at. Here is the whole process, including the parts most suppliers gloss over.
Before anything is cut, we study the source image and decide how it will survive translation into tesserae. Where is the eye drawn? Which edges must stay crisp and which can soften? Which tonal transitions are gradual enough to be built from runs of colour, and which need a hard boundary?
\nThis is the stage where a good mosaicist earns their keep, and it is the stage most automated suppliers skip. If the design logic is wrong here, no amount of careful cutting will rescue it.
\nWe render a mosaic-aware proof: the image redrawn as it will actually appear in tesserae, at the real wall size. You see the artwork as mosaic — not as a photograph — and approve it before production. Where the translation loses something important, we say so and propose a change.
\nTessera size is decided per zone, not for the whole mural. A face might be built at 6 mm and its background at 15 mm. We also set the andamento — the direction of flow of the tesserae. Rows that follow a form make it read as three-dimensional; rows that march in a rectilinear grid flatten it. This single decision is what makes a mosaic look alive or look like tiles.
\nGlass is scored and cut by hand, tessera by tessera, using nippers and cutters. Colours are laid out in work-in-progress runs so tonal transitions can be judged on the work surface, not on a screen. A large detailed mural is many hundreds of hours of this.
\nTesserae are placed face-down onto a paper or film carrier in the reverse of the final image, or set directly, depending on the intended installation method. The reverse method is generally used for wall murals because it lets the whole design be assembled flat and inspected before it ever reaches the wall.
\nFinished work is divided into numbered sections sized to the access route at your site — the lift, the stairwell, the doorway. A setting-out drawing is produced showing exactly where each section lands on the wall, together with adhesive and grout specification. Sections are packed flat with edge protection and shipped.
\nWhy the section plan matters more than it sounds. A mural that arrives as one unmanageable sheet is a site problem; a mural that arrives as twenty numbered sections with a map is a morning’s work for two installers. The documentation is not paperwork — it is what makes the price of installation predictable.
Yes. You approve a mosaic-aware proof before cutting starts, and we send progress photographs during cutting and setting. For contract work we can also supply a sample board of the actual materials before production.
Changes are usually possible until cutting begins, and we will re-proof at no charge. Once tesserae are cut for a specific area, changes in that area become a rework cost. We flag which areas are committed at each milestone.
Face-mounted on paper or film, in numbered sections, tesserae facing down where the method requires it, packed flat with edge protection and shipped on a pallet. The setting-out drawing and material specification are included.
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