Bathroom Flooring

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Here's the flooring I want for both the master bath and for the main floor bathroom.  Home Depot has it for $6.95 per square foot.  Or, can we find it cheaper elsewhere?

Bathroom Design Elements

I have a pretty good idea of what I want the bathrooms in the house to look like.  I like a small patterned black and white flooring, such as this one:

I like these train/hotel type racks for towels.  In all of the metal hardware, I like polished nickel.

I LOVE this textured, pressed glass as a way to bring in light in areas where you want privacy.  I hope we can use some in the house.  This particular pattern is a favorite of mine:

This is a gorgeous bathroom. Though, I'd change the ceiling light fixture to something that better matches the scones (something white/clear with polished nickel accent.)  I'd also make the vanities have storage.  They could be white or dark/antique cherry.  Mostly, I love the feel of this bathroom--so light and bright!

I'd like a deep tub that is long enough to stretch out your legs in, like this one:

I'd like the sinks to have higher, arched faucets.  Just in case you wanted to fill something tall or water a plant.  Something like this, but with less modern handles.

Handles like the one below, faucet like the one above.

Cabinetry would be pretty in a dark/antique cherry or in white.  Countertops/sinks white.  Wall color would be a nice pale blue green.

Kitchen

Throughout most of the house, I'd like to have dark cherry wood floors, white trim and built-ins, with dark (slate or black) quartz countertop on surfaces that might be home to plants or drinks (e.g. low, hip-height bookcases that I would like to have along the south (window) side of our living room.) But, I've been thinking of inverting this in the kitchen: doing dark wood cabinets with white quartz countertops and black and white tile floors. The pictures below (taken from the February 2009 issue of House Beautiful) show the dark cabinets light countertop look. So, it would be something like this but with black and white floors: I like the wall color. I'm not a fan of the recessed ceiling or the marble backsplash behind the stove. I like how the upper cabinets go all the way to ceiling, eliminating that odd space above most upper cabinets that just

Nice French doors in the eat-in area of the kitchen.

Flooring

One of the biggest questions I've had about building a green house has been about flooring. As we plan to use a ground source heating unit and a passive solar design, there are certain issues for flooring. With radiant heating (from ground source) we need to consider the r-value of our flooring choices. If a floor covering is too insulating, the heat won't be able to transfer from the system to the room (or, for cooling, from the room to the system.) As far as I know, they recommend an r-value under 4.0 for radiant heat systems. For passive solar, you want flooring that can soak up the heat from sunlight coming through southern windows, then release the heat as the sun goes down.

For both of these systems, tile, stone or concrete work well. But, it's also my goal to make the house have a "historic feel" and "have a lot of character." In my aesthetic, these ideal materials fall short. Also, I really like having carpet in some rooms, both for its coziness but also because it keeps dirt from swirling about the house and causing an outbreak of dust bunnies.

So, I've been doing some research. Turns out, I may not need to sacrifice my style for the environment. A low pile, synethic carpet (r=.7) with a thin, slab rubber pad (r=.32) doesn't have a bad R-Value (total just over 1.) Linoleum (which I like for kitchens) has a typical r value of .4. Specifically, Marmoleum has a 2.45 value for the kind you install with adhesive and a 1.7 for the floating floor type. Hardwood floors tend to be around r=.7. Engineered wood flooring around .4.

At the same time, I'm shopping around for ceramic tile. Ceramic tile has a typical r-value of .25 (so, non-insulating) and is good as a passive solar mass. My hope is to find a tile that I really like and use that in the room(s) with the most southern exposure, while using flooring that I prefer for aesthetic or functional reasons in other rooms.

Just to keep myself organized, I'm pasting an e-mail from Marmoleum here:
"It will be fine to install either the Marmoleum sheet goods or the Click(our "floating" floor) over radiant heat. We do recommend having theheat shut off or turned down for at least 48 hours before installation,during and 72 hours after installation. It should then be raisedgradually, so adhesive and material can cure/adapt together. Thesubstrate temperature should never exceed 85 degrees. The R-Value of theMarmoleum sheet goods is 2.45, and the Click with a vapor barrier (whichwill be needed when installing over radiant heat) is 1.70.Please let me know if you have any additional questions. Jennifer Malloy Technical Services"