When the work began, the floors were under three layers of linoleum. Beneath, mostly intact, hand-poured cement tiles, each with its pattern: rosettes, stars, interlace.
They were numbered, lifted, washed with black soap and relaid in place. The missing ones were made again by a workshop of craftsmen, in the same pigments, the same size, with the same patience: a tile dries for weeks before it is laid.
A cement tile is not ceramic: it is not fired, it is pressed. That is why it ages so well, and why it is waxed rather than varnished. In the morning, before breakfast, you can still hear it: the polishing pads on the patio floor.
An article signed by the house