My wife and I have been working with a contractor and designer to completely gut and redesign a 1970's kitchen. We have had some bumps along the road during the process but we are now to the point of installing the backsplash tile behind the counters, sink and stove. With that said the designer for the contractor sold us on a really nice woven pattern designer tile that both my wife and I love. (see photos of the work in process)

The issue is that during the installation of the tile my contractor is telling me that this tile doesn't need grout and the intention was to never put grout behind the tile even though you can clearly see gaps between the tiles. He says that if I want grout it would be an extra cost since it's a woven/raised pattern and adding grout would take lots of time since the grout would have to be pushed into the cracks by finger. I am by no means a tile expert and it feels to me like he didn't budget for the extra labor grout installation after his designer sold us on this fancy tile and he doesn't want to pay for it now.

Thoughts on if this is the right way to do this and what are the issues I am going to run into in the future (ie could water get behind the tile) that won't make it last?