Hardwood-Look Tile

Have you seen some of the new products that are actually ceramic or porcelain tile made to look like hardwood?  EngineerHubby has a colleague at work who just installed this in their home, so we went to check it out.  I had read online that it does have grout lines, so I was curious if it looked like tile or hardwood in person.  It was dark when we made it to their house, so my photos could be better.

They purchased an Emser Tile product called Heritage.

Color they chose was Golden Oak.

PDF Brochure for Product

If you look closely, you can see some texture...mimicking hand-scraped hardwood.  They said they were given a choice on grout color.

In the end, we decided against this product for ourselves....EngineerHubby would have gone for it (in the darker Walnut color) but I could not imagine what color grout would be needed to virtually eliminate those grout lines visually...chocolate brown?  (Hardwood flooring has no grout lines...the wood abuts each other.....)  I wonder if the tile could be closer together, making the grout lines less noticeable?

After a client put in a dark tile with chocolate grout, I knew without a doubt that is not for me.

Back to the hardwood look tile......

This couple has 2 huge dogs and they had just run through the house when we got there.  I didn't focus on those areas on the floor, but their wet paw prints were very noticeable...but easily wiped up, I'm sure.

She said a co-worker used her same installer and put in upgraded engineered hardwood...the tile product was more expensive.  That surprised me.

Would this "fool" you in to thinking it was hardwood?  I have looked online and a few other brands do a better job of mimicking the hardwood look, I think, but it is hard to tell just by photos.  With our builder,  this was our only option.  I am very glad I was able to go see this in person.

Anyone else have this in their home or has seen it in person?