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Where Artistry Begins
Moroccan lime burnished with a stone and soaped to repel water, laid by our own artisans on a properly prepared base in Liverpool bathrooms.
Tadelakt in Liverpool is Moroccan lime plaster, burnished with a stone and then worked with olive oil soap until it repels water without any film or sealer on top. It is the traditional surface of the hammam, and it is what we recommend for a shower wall in a Liverpool bathroom. Zavoré supplies and installs it. We are based in Birmingham, and our own artisans travel to Liverpool to burnish it by hand.
A tadelakt wall is a system, not just a coat. The finish is the visible part, and what sits behind it decides whether it lasts. Start with a call about the room, then a burnished sample board in your colour.
Liverpool's bigger Victorian and Edwardian houses, in places like Sefton Park and Allerton, can have the space for a proper wet room, with a bench, a niche and a curved wall. Tadelakt handles curves more easily than flat runs, and it carries on over a niche or a reveal as one surface. There is no grout to go black and no silicone to peel.
The base matters more than the lime. Tadelakt wants a mineral, absorbent, stable bed such as a sand and cement render or a lime render. Older solid walls in a terrace can suit that well, as long as damp is dealt with first. In a city centre apartment the walls are usually plasterboard. Board on its own is not a bed for tadelakt in a wet area. It needs tanking and a suitable rendered base built up over it first, and a bare modern skim is not a surface we would use inside a shower.
All of that adds preparation, and we say so at the survey rather than after the quote. Corners are formed radiused rather than sharp, because a stone cannot burnish into a right angle.
Tadelakt is not flat and not glassy. The stone leaves a soft, low sheen with faint mottling, and the wall catches the light the way tile never does. Colour is lime fast and runs to clay reds, ochres, olive greens, plaster pinks, off whites and charcoals. Two panels burnished on different days will not match exactly, and the joins are part of the character. If that idea worries you, tadelakt is probably the wrong finish.
Keep it off busy floors and away from harsh cleaners. You can read about the material on our tadelakt finishes page.
We survey the wall first. That means what the wall is made of, how flat and sound it is, any damp or movement, and what tanking is already behind it. Photos can answer small questions. If the wall needs rendering, tanking or a damp fix before any lime goes on, we tell you plainly.
A sample is agreed before work starts, in our 48 house colours, and the material is tinted to the approved sample before it leaves Birmingham. The burnishing window is short and physical, and it is why tadelakt is priced as labour rather than material.
Liverpool is away from our Birmingham base, so a bathroom job is planned in blocks of days. The render, the lime and the soap all need to go on in order, and the team stays on site to see that happen. Dates are agreed once the sample and price are signed off. The full process is on the tadelakt installation page.
Tadelakt is maintained with soap, not chemicals. A mild soap wash keeps feeding the surface, and the shine improves with use. Limescale removers, bleach, bathroom sprays and scouring pads all attack lime. Wipe the shower down after use. A dulled patch is re soaped and re polished in place rather than cut out.
The shop sells tadelakt in tubs, tinted to your colour, with finishing soap for pale and dark colours and olive oil soap for maintenance. Be realistic, though. It is the hardest finish we stock, and a shower that has not been closed properly will wet through and you will only find out later. For a bathroom you use every day, call us. Browse the shop, and trade customers can ask about a trade account.
Tadelakt is for water. Elsewhere in the house the choices widen. A seamless floor that runs into the shower area is microcement in Liverpool. For tall hallways, look at polished plaster in Liverpool or the calmer marmorino in Liverpool. Bedrooms and sitting rooms suit clay plaster in Liverpool or limewash in Liverpool. A cool grey feature wall is concrete effect plaster in Liverpool, and a shimmer is liquid metal in Liverpool. The whole range is under decorative specialists in Liverpool, and our area guide covers Venetian plastering in Liverpool.
Yes, when it is burnished and soaped properly and laid on a tanked, correctly rendered wall, exactly as tile would be. The waterproofing is a system and tadelakt is the visible part of it. We check the wall at the survey.
Not directly in a wet area. Plasterboard needs tanking and a rendered base built up over it before the lime goes near it. In a dry room a suitable base over board can work. A bare modern skim is not a bed we would use.
With mild soap and water, and nothing else. Avoid bleach, limescale removers, sprays and abrasives, because lime tolerates none of them. Wipe or squeegee the shower after use and give the wall a fresh soaping now and then.
We would keep it to walls and gentle areas rather than floors with heavy foot traffic. For a seamless floor that runs into the shower, microcement on a prepared, waterproofed base is the usual answer.
For a bathroom, call 07592 929191 (Monday to Saturday, 9am to 6pm) or email sales@zavore.co.uk with photos, rough measurements and the postcode. Order a burnished sample board and hold it in the room it is meant for.
Order a sample board tinted to your colour, or send photos and rough measurements of the walls in Liverpool and we will come back to you with the right finish and a clear quote.
For a quote, email photos and measurements of your walls to sales@zavore.co.uk or call 07592 929191, Monday to Saturday, 9am to 6pm.
See every area we cover.
We also supply the trade by post, wherever you are. The shop ships tracked across the UK, and the Academy teaches the finishes in Birmingham.
Providing luxury finishes for the most prestigious addresses in the world
Venetian plaster, limewash, microcement, tadelakt, metallics, sculptural plaster and gold leaf, supplied and installed by our own team, with Venetian plaster taught at our Birmingham studio.
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