Does he mean hexagonal?
You can't tile with only octagons -- 
you need squares as well.

And the dimension given -- 
is it side to side or vertex to vertex?

We did a (half-)bathroom floor with tile
a couple of years ago, in Chicago.
I had great fun working out how to
turn the corners and finish the edges.

At 03:00 PM 1/13/2011, you wrote:
>Ladies and Gentlemen, I have this incoming query from a resident of the great state of Minnesota.   
>Can anyone suggest a route of investigation?   Is there a Tile-L?    Christopher 
> 
>In a message dated 1/13/2011 3:48:29 P.M. Eastern Standard Time, [log in to unmask] writes:
>
>Christopher Gray 
>New York Times 
>New York, New York 
>
>Dear Mr. Gray: 
>
>I have been given your name by my daughter, a 2009 masters graduate of Columbia's GSAPP program, who thought you might be able to help me determine whether any tile manufacturers still produce what I can only describe as 7/8" octagonal tile - the tile frequently found in the entrance and bathrooms of 1920s and earlier buildings in New York.  I live in Minneapolis, am currently renovating a house, and would like to use this tile but cannot identifya manufacturer.  There is 2" octagonal tile but nothing smaller.  The tile I am looking for was in the bathroom of a Minneapolis house I owned that was built in the 1920s and I have seen it in other houses of that period as well as in commercial buildings.  My daughter is confident that if it is still manufactured you are the one person who can identify the manufacturer.
>
>Thank you for your consideration of this request.  To date the search has yielded nothing but frustration. 
>
>Sincerely yours, 
>Brian Palmer 

Martin C. Tangora
University of Illinois at Chicago
[log in to unmask]

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