Blue and White Backsplash Styles

Blue and white kitchen backsplash tile style varies from flowers and folk figures to geometrics.

These days, blue and white backsplash chic is geometric. That makes it versatile since geometrics can go in most any direction. One road leads to patchwork [top] wonderfully expressed in the Novecento tile collection from Made a Mano, a tile house located in Copenhagen, London and Paris. The mix of dark (indigo) blue patterns has a light, contemporary feel that marries beautifully with a vintage natural brass wall mounted sink faucet with spoke handles.

The polar opposite of patchwork is antique blue and white figural tile. This backsplash harkens back to the time when Portuguese traders brought all manner of blue and white k’ang hsi porcelain to Europe from China. When pieced together the tile depicts a rustic cartouche with sailing ships at the center and cascading leaves on the side. Brass kitchen fixtures, shunned for so long, have made an especially strong comeback, particularly in Europe. This natural brass bridge faucet is paired with black granite and a stainless steel sink.

In a stunning Anthony Baratta Gothic-revival kitchen, tiles with indigo figures on a white ground create a wonderful diagonal pattern alternating with solid blue tiles. In one sense this offers the best of both worlds since the pattern itself is geometric while the tiles are not.

A thoroughly contemporary kitchen has blue and white geometrics that mimic Moroccan cement tile motifs. Yet the tile pattern is a replica done in removable decals from a Dutch source that no longer has a website I could find. Fortunately, Murals Wallpaper has a Blue and White Portuguese Tile pattern that is similar. Additionally Muriva Moroccan Tiles Wallpaper, from Select Wallpaper, is a bit more eclectic but with the same spirit.

North Carolina designer Lisa Mende worked with an existing 1970s traditional Delft tile floral backsplash but did a stunning update by changing everything around it — including the counters, cabinets and appliances.

A close up “before” shot shows the dated tile counter and cooktop.

In the finished kitchen the vintage blue and white tile looks brand new.

It’s fascinating to me that blue and white tile has been used in homes continually for hundreds of years. It goes by different names depending on the origin — Dutch Delft, Portuguese, and Moroccan usually. Contemporary tile designers have embroidered on these themes with a variety of different looks. But those of us who are lovers of blue and white favor them all.

(Source: madeamano, Essence of the Good Life, anthonybaratta, House Beautiful, Lisa Mende Design)

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