Maurizio. Please help. I have a new bathroom. Cream classico tile on floors and walls, emperador light in shower, and emperador dark on hot tub box. I have gotten so many conflicting opinions on how to clean this tile before I start using the bathroom, as well as what to seal it with, how to seal it, and finally how to maintain it. Someone told me to use bleach or vinegar for cleaning . Is this true? If so, what is preferable? What ratio of bleach or vinegar to water do I use? Should I seal the floors and walls and tub box too? If so, how long after I clean the tile do I seal? And how do I seal? What products should I use to seal? Do I use bleach or vinegar for regular maintenance cleaning too? If so, what ratio of bleach/vinegar to water? How often can the marble withstand such cleaning? I usually do heavy cleaning one per week. Is that reasonable? thanks. Sue

 

Dear Sue:

 

“ how long after I clean the tile do I seal? ”

 

Never.

Polished marble can seldom be sealed, and none of your can. They are too dense to take any sealer in. (Keep in mind that sealers for stone are impregnators – bot sealers. And impregnator are strictly below-surface products. Which means that they must be absorbed by the stone to work.) Not to mention that no stone should ever be sealed when installed in a wet environment.

 

“ Someone told me to use bleach or vinegar for cleaning . Is this true? ”

 

The only comment that I will make to that is that if jack-asses could fly, the person who gave you that amazing piece of advice would never need to buy another pair of shoes again!

Take a spare tile of your Crema Classico and then “clean” it with water and vinegar. Let me know what it looks like once your done!!

 

“ How often can the marble withstand such cleaning? ”

 

Wrong question. The right question should be: how long can marble withstand such cleaning?

And the answer to that is: only a few seconds!

 

I do believe that you need some serious stone care intelligence!... J   

The issue of what you'll be doing day in and day out to your stone is – as it should be intuitive – vastly more important than its sealing (if and when possible and/or advisable) and it's all too often neglected. As you can tell by reading many of this site's postings, you're not likely to get good information about routine care from your dealer or installer. Don't become another statistic! By logging into the Helpful Hints section of our website at:   http://www.mbstone.com/HH_promo/helpful_hints.htm, you will be able to get the short version of our maintenance guidelines at no charge. The full version of it – a 7-page document considered by many as an industry benchmark – is available in pay-per-download format in our Educational Literature section at:   http://www.mbstone.com/literature/literature.htm.  

And remember, every single penny of the cost of the literature will be used to support this site and its cause: your cause.

While you are in the “Helpful Hints” section, do spend some time reading all of the interesting FREE articles you'll find in there!

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Thank you  

Ciao and good luck,

Mauri zio Bertoli

 

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