Bowmans · Inspiration · Design
Andy Cohen’s colourful bathroom: a grown-up approach to mosaic
By Jonathon Barclay · · 11 min read
If Andy Cohen’s colourful bathroom has made you reconsider mosaic, the useful idea isn’t simply to choose a brighter tile. It’s to treat the mosaic, grout and surrounding finishes as one design decision.
Architectural Digest’s tour of Cohen’s Hamptons home, published on 25 June 2026, identifies Bisazza mosaic tiles in the primary bathroom. The room received further design coverage from Homes & Gardens on 10 August. Neither source names the mosaic collection or gives enough technical detail to infer how it was installed.
What you can take from the room is the confidence to use a fine-scale, colourful surface without making the bathroom feel childish. For your own bathroom, we would decide where the mosaic stops, how its colours relate to the rest of the room and what the grout does to the pattern before placing an order.
The main decision Use mosaic as a complete surface when you want colour and pattern to define the bathroom. Restrict it to the shower, vanity wall, niche or a narrow detail when the room already contains strong furniture, stone, brassware or several competing finishes.
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Why colourful mosaic can still feel grown-up
Colourful mosaic works best when the palette is controlled, even if the pattern itself is lively.
That doesn’t mean every piece needs to be the same colour. It means the colours need to belong together and have a clear relationship with the larger surfaces in the room. A mosaic containing several blues, for example, will be easier to work with if the floor, furniture and paint aren’t all introducing unrelated colours of their own.
We would normally choose the mosaic first if it’s going to be the main feature. It’s much easier to find a quiet floor tile, basin or paint colour that supports a distinctive mosaic than it is to find a distinctive mosaic that happens to work with several products already ordered.
The size of the pattern matters as well. Fine detail becomes a texture when you stand back, while a larger motif remains more obvious across the room. Neither is automatically better. The question is whether you want to notice the overall colour first or read the individual pattern.
And you don’t need decorative furniture, unusual brassware and a statement bath simply because the mosaic is colourful. In most rooms, we would let one or two elements carry the character and keep the rest quieter.
Should you use mosaic across a whole surface or as a feature?
Use it across a complete surface when that surface deserves to become the focus of the room. Restrict it when the mosaic would otherwise compete with too many other details.
A token strip isn’t always the safest choice. If it has no relationship with the basin, bath, shower or architecture, it can look as though the tiling budget ran out halfway through the idea. A smaller area still needs a reason for being there.
| Where to use the mosaic | Design advantage | Main trade-off |
|---|---|---|
| Whole shower enclosure | Gives the shower a clear identity and allows the colour to wrap around the space | Corners, controls, niches and sheet joints all become part of the pattern |
| Full vanity wall | Frames the basin, mirror and lighting and can be enjoyed without being behind wet glass | Tap positions, sockets and mirror edges need careful setting out |
| Bath wall | Creates a strong backdrop and can connect the bath to the wider colour scheme | The effect can be lost if the bath, screen or furniture covers too much of it |
| Shower niche | Introduces colour in a controlled area and can tie into a larger tiled surface | Small cuts and poorly aligned edges are particularly noticeable |
| Narrow strip or border | Can repeat a colour without covering a large area | Often looks added on unless it aligns with an architectural or product detail |
| Complete room | Makes the mosaic the defining material rather than a decorative extra | It needs a disciplined palette because every fitting and finish sits against it |
A whole shower
A whole shower is often the strongest place for an expressive mosaic. The enclosure gives it natural boundaries, so the change of material feels deliberate.
But the setting-out needs to be resolved before installation. We would want to see how the pattern meets the shower entrance, internal corners, niche and brassware. If the mosaic has an obvious direction, that needs to remain consistent as it turns from one wall to another.
A patterned mosaic can also be interrupted by a large shower valve, handset rail or shelf. That isn’t necessarily a problem, but those positions should be decided on the drawing rather than wherever the pipework happens to emerge.
A vanity wall
The vanity wall is a good alternative if you want the mosaic to remain visible from the doorway. It can give a fairly simple basin and mirror arrangement much more character without surrounding the entire room in pattern.
Here, we would set out the wall around the centre line of the basin and mirror. The edges around furniture, taps and lighting need to look intentional. A beautiful mosaic won’t rescue a mirror that finishes on an awkward sliver of tile.
A niche or narrow detail
A niche can work well when you want a smaller amount of colour, but it isn’t automatically easier. The mosaic has to meet every edge of a shallow box, and that makes uneven cuts or untidy corners difficult to ignore.
We would normally either line the niche properly with the mosaic or keep it in the main wall tile. A small patch on the back can work, but only if its colours and proportions connect with something else in the bathroom.
Our view
If the mosaic is the reason you like the scheme, give it a complete area such as the shower or vanity wall. If the room already has strongly figured stone, coloured furniture or distinctive brassware, use the mosaic more selectively. Don’t reduce it to a decorative strip unless the layout gives that strip a clear purpose.
Choose the grout with the tile
Grout isn’t the finishing touch with mosaic. It changes how the whole surface looks.
Because mosaic contains so many joints, the grout colour occupies a meaningful part of what you see. A close match can soften the grid and let the colours merge more readily. A contrasting grout makes each piece and every slight change of alignment easier to see.
That can be useful with a simple geometric mosaic where you want the individual shapes to be clear. With a more detailed or multicoloured design, strong contrast may add another layer of pattern that the room doesn’t need.
Don’t make this decision from a loose sheet held against a grout chart. Ask for a fully grouted sample panel using the intended tile and proposed grout. View it vertically if it’s being used on a wall, and look at it with the other finishes that will be in the room.
The manufacturer also needs to guide the installation system. Bisazza states that its semi-transparent glass mosaics require white adhesive because a different adhesive colour can alter their appearance. That is product-specific guidance for those glass mosaics, not a rule for every mosaic and not evidence of what was used in Cohen’s bathroom.
Bisazza also explains that grout colour affects the installed appearance. Your fitter should confirm the current compatible adhesive and grout for the exact mosaic, background and location you’re specifying.
Don’t approve the tile without seeing it grouted. A loose mosaic sheet leaves the gaps empty, so it cannot show you the finished balance between tile and grout. The sample you approve should reproduce the combination you intend to install.
Setting out matters more with mosaic
Mosaic can follow curves and fit detailed areas more readily than a large tile, but that doesn’t make the installation forgiving.
Most mosaics arrive mounted in sheets. If the spacing within or between those sheets isn’t handled carefully, you may see the sheet boundaries once the wall is grouted. The problem is particularly obvious under strong bathroom lighting or across a plain, evenly coloured design.
Before work begins, we would want the fitter to inspect:
- Where full sheets can start and finish.
- Whether the pattern has a clear top, bottom or direction.
- How the joints between sheets compare with the spacing between individual pieces.
- What happens at internal and external corners.
- How the mosaic returns into window reveals or niches.
- Where taps, shower controls and other penetrations interrupt the pattern.
- Whether the background is properly prepared for the chosen product and system.
An experienced mosaic fitter should be involved before the final quantity is ordered. Setting out can affect how many sheets are needed, especially if the design contains a repeat or requires selected sections to meet cleanly.
Our bathroom tile layout ideas explain how direction, centre lines and pattern boundaries affect the finished room. Mosaic needs the same planning, even though the individual pieces are much smaller.
Check the exact product for the exact location
Small tiles aren’t automatically suitable for every bathroom floor or wet area.
The number of grout joints may change how a surface feels underfoot, but it doesn’t prove that the tile itself is suitable or provides the grip you need. A mosaic sold for a wall shouldn’t be assumed to work on a shower floor simply because the pieces are small.
Before ordering, confirm the intended use with the supplier and manufacturer. That includes whether the exact mosaic is suitable for:
- Walls or floors
- Shower enclosures and other wet areas
- The chosen background and adhesive system
- The proposed grout
- The cleaning and maintenance you’re prepared to follow
This matters with decorative mosaics because products that look similar can be made from different materials or have different finishes. Glass, ceramic, porcelain, stone and mixed-material mosaics shouldn’t be treated as interchangeable.
Our bathroom tiles buyer’s guide covers the wider material decision if you’re still comparing mosaic with porcelain, natural stone or larger-format tiles.
Plan how you’ll clean it
A mosaic surface has more grout joints than a large-format tile. If you use it across a whole shower, those joints become part of the cleaning routine.
That doesn’t mean you should avoid mosaic in a wet area. It means the tile, grout and cleaning guidance need to be chosen together. Ask what the exact mosaic can be cleaned with, whether its surface needs any special care and what maintenance the proposed grout requires.
We wouldn’t give generic advice about acidic or abrasive cleaners because the correct method depends on the mosaic and grout. Follow the current manufacturer instructions for both products. If the tile supplier and grout maker give conflicting guidance, resolve that before installation rather than experimenting on the finished wall.
The grout colour also has a practical effect. Very pale grout and very dark grout show different kinds of residue, so choose it with the room’s water exposure and your tolerance for regular cleaning in mind, not just from the sample board.
Build the rest of the bathroom around the mosaic
Once the mosaic is chosen, edit the rest of the scheme.
Start by identifying which colour within the mosaic you want the room to respond to. It doesn’t have to be the brightest one. Often, the quieter background colour gives you a better direction for the floor, furniture or painted walls.
Then decide which items should disappear and which should stand out. If the mosaic already contains several colours and a clear pattern, we would usually keep the sanitaryware simple and avoid another highly figured surface nearby. If the mosaic is mainly one colour with subtle variation, there may be more room for distinctive furniture or brassware.
The pattern boundary should also relate to the architecture. Ending a mosaic at the edge of a shower, the width of a vanity or the return of a wall looks considered. Stopping it at an arbitrary height or halfway across an uninterrupted wall is harder to explain.
Bring the mosaic sample, a floor plan and photographs of the room to a showroom appointment. We can look at whether it deserves a complete wall or a more restricted area, then compare grout and surrounding finishes on an actual sample board.
Bowman Bathrooms offers bathroom design and supply from Braintree and Leigh-on-Sea, as well as supply-only specifications for clients working with their own fitter.