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Epoxy grout isn’t new, says Graveline, but traditional epoxy grouts, like oil-based paints, can be difficult to install and messy to clean up. “Because installation historically has been more difficult with epoxy grout, homeowners wouldn’t use it and architects wouldn’t specify it. Older epoxies were a little like mixing sand and molasses together. The result was a very sticky substance that was not very user friendly.”

Laticrete’s new of expoxy grout, he says, has changed all that. “It installs just like a cement grout and cleans up with water.”

Its primary advantage is that it is about 30 times less absorptive than cement grout, vastly more highly resistant to stains and, Graveline says, “almost as hard as tile itself.”

The addition of an admixture Laticrete calls “Dazzle” enables users to create a metallic appearance or even to make the grout glow in the dark.

“We have made grout a design element instead of just being the stuff that holds tile in,” Scranton says. “This is a designer’s dream.”

Scranton says Laticrete initially saw glow-in-the-dark grout as a product that would address safety concerns, in hospitals, or subways, for instance. But the stuff has come to be used in nightclubs, or in children’s bathrooms as an effective nightlight that will retain its luminosity for up to 16 hours.

Because of its imperviousness to water, and because it is far more resilient than cement grout, Graveline says epoxy grout can be used in ways and places designers may have been reluctant to use grout in the past. Grout joints can be widened with less fear that the joints will crack or discolor.

Installers like it because it reduces call-backs, Graveline says. “Cement grout is one of the biggest headaches installers face,” he says. “There is $2.5 billion in ceramic tile sold in the U.S. each year. Service calls can quickly become a real problem.”