Benefits of Porcelain Paving

Porcelain Paving has many advantages over standard natural quarried stones or concrete paving. These include the following:

• Super strong & durable
• Easy to clean
• No need to seal
• Easier maintenance
• Frost resistant
• Algae resistant
• Non-Porous (Waterproof)
• Better slip resistance
• Scratch and abrasion-resistant
• Consistent colouration
• Fade-resistant

Porcelain Paving vs Natural Stone Paving

Porcelain paving ticks all the boxes. The material quality, improved performance characteristics, extended longevity, and lower maintenance/upkeep of porcelain paving significantly lowers lifetime-costs for any garden patio paving when compared to natural stone or concrete paving.

Porcelain will outlive all other types of stone, which will save you money in the long run; especially as typically, the slabs only account for 20-30% of the initial cost of laying a new patio installation. If kept well maintained, your porcelain patio will still look brand new in 10 years time.  You simply can’t put a price on slabs of this quality when looking at the long-term (10 years plus) solution for your garden. Because porcelain exterior tiles are vitrified (glass-like) and the material is a solid homogeneous slab, it is waterproof and impervious. This means that dirt and grime, algae and lichen cannot penetrate and get in the material of these paving slabs. This makes keeping them clean and maintaining them much easier. Simply brush off leaves and detritus and wash with warm soapy water.

Laying Porcelain Slabs

Porcelain paving uses printed designs on the surface of the slab to create the patterns. Each pack will typically contain a variety of tile designs to ensure sufficient visual variation when you lay them. To ensure you do not lay matching patterns adjacent to one another and to ensure the blend/mix looks more varied, we advise inspecting the slabs prior to installation and determining your laying pattern. This ensures that the overall desired hue/pattern is achieved and evens out any slight colour discrepancies when laying more than one pack. Laying your patio one pallet at a time can lead to slight but visible colour banding.

Porcelain paving is non-porous and, therefore, requires a Slurry Primer to ensure it bonds properly with the bedding mortar. The priming slurry should be applied to the underside of each paving tile just prior to laying. Please refer to the laying instructions if in any doubt.

A flexible Jointing Grout should be used, and care must be taken not to let it dry on the surface of the tile. We recommend applying a protective sealant to your porcelain tiles to help prevent marking from grout residue (Porcelain Tile Protector).

To install and lay porcelain patio paving slabs, you'll need to do the following steps:

1. Measure up and mark out your patio - ensure you calculate both 1) area in square metres (m2)  and 2) the fall (slope) required for drainage.
2. Dig out the patio area to create the substrate (220 -230 mm depth).
3. Lay the sub-base of MOT Type-1 hardcore (compacted & 150 mm depth).
4. Coat the slabs' underside with priming slurry to ensure their bond. As porcelain is non-porous, priming slurry is essential to ensure you are able to successfully bond the slabs to the bedding mortar.
5. Trowel-in and lay a bedding course of mortar mix (50 mm depth) immediately prior to laying each slab.
6. Lay the paving slabs on to the mortar bed and tamp down. Ensure you leave the desired joint spacing between the slabs and the slabs are “level” to the fall.
7. Leave to set for 24 hours, so the mortar mix can cure enough for you to walk on the slabs.
8. Grout the joints between the paving (pointing) with exterior tile grout. We would advise using Pavestone Porcelain Tile Protector to make removing grout residue easier.

To calculate the areas of paving in square-metres (m2), the amount of sub-base hardcore or the amount of sand and cement you'll need for the mortar mix bedding course, please refer to our paving calculators.

Step-by-Step Patio Installation Guide

Please see our step-by-step installation guide, which includes videos for all the key steps - How to lay a patio.

If you require any additional information on laying our porcelain, please give us a call on 01993 608 824 and speak to our dedicated expert paving team.

Care & Maintenance

Because porcelain paving is non-porous, many of the issues that arise with concrete and natural stone paving, do not occur with porcelain outdoor tiles. Walked-on dirt and grime and washed-on soluble grime and dirt are almost guaranteed on every patio. With porcelain paving slabs, this dirt and grime is largely superficial and sitting on the surface, as it cannot penetrate the vitrified homogeneous porcelain tile. Therefore, most of this build up of grime can be dealt with by brushing down your porcelain patio with yard brush and warm soapy water, and rinsing off with a garden hose.

There will inevitably be windblown or falling detritus and organic material such as leaves, twigs, nuts, seeds and grass cuttings that come to settle on your patio. These can transfer a contact stain when they are wet/damp of natural tannin pigments (akin to a tea stain) that will leave brown marks on your slab. Obviously, the first solution is to regularly sweep off any organic material that settles on your porcelain patio. However, should the paving become stained with tannins, then Pavestone Porcelain Patio Cleaner is recommended to help remove these blemishes.