For The Builder And Team

[kia cat]

we've treated ourselves to a marble statue for the garden. It needs to be on a plinth to display it better and to stop dog using it as a lampost.

Have some old marble floor tiles, which I thought I could use to clad a block of concrete. Any tips on fixing or pitfalls, please? Maybe embed some wood in the setting concrete to allow them to be screwed on ? The tiles are roughly 10 inches square. or would I be better off just casting a block of concrete - even adding some peat for the stone effect? Thanks all for your wisdom ;)

[The Builder]

Hi Kia. By all means use the tiles. The first thing to do would be to prime the concrete with diluted PVA. Something around 3 parts water to 1 PVA.

Mix some regular mortar. Roughly 3 sand to 1 cement.
Paste the back of each tile with neat PVA.

Either apply the mortar to the concrete, or to the tile, then stick it in place.

To stop everything sliding around too much, let the diluted PVA on the concrete get tacky before tiling.

Carefully prop the bottom course of tiles to keep them all from slumping.

Your most difficult decision will be what to do at the corners, if the tiles have no "face" edge.

Screws may be added afterwards if they're likely to get kicked. Just drill right through the tile into the concrete with a 6mm masonry drill.
Poke a red Rawlplug into the hole with a 2" x 8 screw, and screw it in.
Countersink the hole first with a 10mm drill bit.
How you cover the screw head rather depends on the tile, but, powdered tile dust mixed with PVA will do it.