Do you need to grout vertically stacked tiles on fireplace surround?

Question

We are installing a wood mantle over our fireplace and are going to put in 4x4 stone (travertine or the like) tiles as facing material. I will put down a small piece of cementboard for the tiles to sit on and am planning on using some standard thinset (as I just used on my floor). However, I saw a picture of "stacked" tile - that is simply applied and butted up against one another thereby creating a minimal joint and no grout was applied. This looked really cool and I think would be a nice look on my fireplace but dont know the technical consequences of doing this...would this somehow weaken the adhesion of the tiles to cement board? Technically it would also be easier as there would be all the grout application mess. Secondly, is there a different, more heat resistant mortar that I should use for this application than the same stuff I just put my bathroom floor in with?

Answer 1

Hi mehls,

The thinset should be fine, but here's two thoughts on no grout joints...

1.  Unless it is rectified (a process by which the edges of the tile are ground after being fired in the kiln to ensure close to perfection sizing), you may run into a place where it is unavoidable to have a space between the tile or your butted tiles will run out of square.  This may not be much of a concern to your particular project with only one or two rows.

2.  It is possible that dust could collect in the joint, and over time the joint may become darker as the collection of dirt grows.

As a pro, I tend to steer folks away from going without grout and absolutely will not install a floor without grout.  Walls are different, and having groutless joints will not affect the bonding of the tile to the substrate. ;)