Bathroom Ideas
need center drain not linear. Need big drain and pipes.
Wood accents, shiplap walls, a sliding barn door and Shaker-style cabinetry all bring farmhouse-style warmth to this transitional bath. Notable detail: The mirrored sliding barn door helps bounce light around this space. The vanity mirrors, knee-wall top and tub shelf all pick up on the wood in this piece. *** Consider mirrored slider doors in other parts of home to bounce light around. *****
Integrated lighting. The designer of this modern home in Germany integrated lights into the vanity mirror. The streamlined look forgoes pendant lights from above or sconces to the side of the mirror. It also provides effective lighting at face level, which is ideal for plucking eyebrows, shaving and other grooming routines that benefit from good lighting.
Brown bought the Indian wedding table that now serves as her vanity from Maryland dealer Great Stuff by Paul at the Country Living Antique Fair in Columbus, Ohio. It took her contractor about a day and a half to retrofit it, install the sinks and faucet, and add modern towel bars underneath. Open vanities like this leave the pipes and drains exposed. Brown opted for steel to go with the more industrial look she prefers and to coordinate with the towel bars and other fixtures. More budget finds: Brown shopped for great deals on the other bathroom fixtures and furnishings. She found the tin-framed mirrors for $35 at a discount home store, painted the black frames white and distressed them with sandpaper. The sconces came from a Pottery Barn outlet, and she found the vessel sinks on Amazon for $79. All of the plumbing fixtures are from Lowe's.
Large-format pressed porcelain tiles have transformed the look of today’s kitchens and bathrooms. “Extra large, thin, light, strong, durable, versatile, eco-friendly and beautiful —technical pressed porcelain is the future of architectural surfaces,” Bird says. Aside from their game-changing size, these new-generation porcelain products come in myriad finishes, textures and colors. The printing technology used to “dress” these tiles with pattern and texture is now so advanced that in many cases, it’s hard to distinguish them from the real thing, whether that’s natural stone, wood, concrete or another material. Modern Bathroom by PLANtoBUILD PLANtoBUILD These wafer-fine, large-format porcelain products are resistant to heat, scratching, chemical damage and staining, and they can be laid on horizontal and vertical surfaces, which makes them suitable for an incredibly wide range of applications in all wet areas, including kitchens and bathrooms. They can be wrapped around kitchen counters and islands, used to create seamless backsplashes or used to clad bathroom walls. Most are suitable for flooring too (consult with your tile specialist).
Large-format pressed porcelain tiles have transformed the look of today’s kitchens and bathrooms. “Extra large, thin, light, strong, durable, versatile, eco-friendly and beautiful —technical pressed porcelain is the future of architectural surfaces,” Bird says. Aside from their game-changing size, these new-generation porcelain products come in myriad finishes, textures and colors. The printing technology used to “dress” these tiles with pattern and texture is now so advanced that in many cases, it’s hard to distinguish them from the real thing, whether that’s natural stone, wood, concrete or another material. Modern Bathroom by PLANtoBUILD PLANtoBUILD These wafer-fine, large-format porcelain products are resistant to heat, scratching, chemical damage and staining, and they can be laid on horizontal and vertical surfaces, which makes them suitable for an incredibly wide range of applications in all wet areas, including kitchens and bathrooms. They can be wrapped around kitchen counters and islands, used to create seamless backsplashes or used to clad bathroom walls. Most are suitable for flooring too (consult with your tile specialist).
see cast iron tub
the high-back farmhouse sink is installed without cabinetry to expose its underside and the plumbing, resulting in a chic, utilitarian look.
like the frame with the sink - big single just fine
Even a single faucet sink with a drainboard
Sink!
Look in the comments section too. Besides the back lighting in the medicine chest and LED lighting at floor level, there are some nice cabinet fronts - semi-clear - and LED lights from Ikea - and clever cabinet design for storage - a link to NSF heavy duty racks for shelving is down in there too.
Cramer kept the vibe clean and minimal by installing a frameless wall-to-wall mirror above the vanity. Glass and nickel globe sconces were mounted directly on the mirror.
Embracing the open and airy feel of the layout, Cramer installed a new custom floating vanity to show off the tile that extends underneath it. The same quartz used on the shower bench also covers the top of the vanity. Shaker-style doors and drawers were gussied up with chrome knobs and pulls to complement the sink’s chrome Kohler faucet.
The original shower had a low ceiling soffit that Cramer removed. The design team covered the shower walls in a handmade painted turquoise ceramic tile. “Each tile has a little bit of variation, which adds a lot of dimension in the shower,” Cramer says. The shower features a quartz bench ideal for taking a seat or holding items that won’t fit in the wall niche. Cramer also carried the gray-and-white geometric tile into the shower to make the space feel connected.
homeowner in Los Angeles’ up-and-coming Mar Vista neighborhood called on designer Marissa Cramer to update her gloomy guest bathroom. With dark wood paneling, navy tile and only 55 square feet of space, the room felt somewhat cramped. “We wanted to open it up and make it lighter but still have some fun with color and accessories,” Cramer says. “Her house is filled with treasures from all her travels. She is a really fun, eclectic woman.” A renovation allowed Cramer to start from scratch. The old vanity, paneling, floor and shower were removed. The new space features walls painted in Benjamin Moore’s Simply White and floors tiled in a gray geometric encaustic cement tile. “Since I was going to do turquoise on the shower walls, I needed something neutral on the floors,” Cramer says. “Gray is such a great contrast with turquoise.”
Kill cold spots. For showers on outside walls with soap nooks (love them), tuck a piece of rigid foam insulation behind the backer board before you tile to minimize a cold spot inside the home.
Hiding the plumbing — or not. Not! Think carefully about fixtures and all the stuff that’s connected to them as you lay out the plumbing, electrical and framing, not the other way around. This will help you avoid mistakes and do tighter work. You may choose to leave plumbing supply lines exposed, as in the bathroom here, for a more industrial or vintage look. Or you may choose to hide them behind the sink pedestal for a more modern look. Little things make big impressions.
Curbed-shower enthusiasm. A curbless shower makes a bathroom feel bigger and look cleaner — plus, it's very practical for aging-in-place homeowners, since it adheres to universal design principles. This look is fairly easy to achieve in a new bathroom or a remodel — just make sure you mention it to your architect or contractor prior to construction.
Special considerations: Since ceramic tiles often have texture, you may want to consider this to add dimension to your bathroom. The eased edge on this tile adds a little extra something to a bathroom wall, but can make it difficult to figure out how to cut end tile. Consider using a tile edge profile, like a Schluter strip, to make the transition less awkward.
Hearing a hollow noise when you're walking across newly tiled floors could be the early signs of tile bond failure. This sound results from poor thinset coverage. In this photo the floor tile goes underneath the tub skirt. This is a solid design that allows for movement on the floor tile. Tip: Gently tapping set tiles with the wooden handle of a rubber mallet can help you find the hollow noise where poor thinset coverage has occurred.
This photo shows some great tile work. The beautiful tile is nicely lined up, but I especially appreciate how there's no mortar or thinset where the tile meets the wall. Using mortar here can lead to tenting issues, since it prevents the tile floor from moving and expanding. This clean finish is exactly what you want to see in your bathroom. Make sure your tile contractor understands that you don't want your installation done with thinset on the edges that meet the wall.
Cure between steps. Sealing tile and natural stone can enhance many tiles. A solid practice is to prepare a sample tile board and seal it before sealing an entire bathroom or shower — all of which should be done prior to installing the floor tile. Make sure you stay off these floors until they’re fully cured, and wait as long as possible before sealing the job. Don’t let your crew install the tile in two days, grout the third and then seal the following day. Each stage needs time to dry before proceeding.
When working with a linear drain that has a tile insert, your grout joints should run through the drain for a flowing look. This shower is a gem, set by Tarkus Tile. A good setter will blend the inventory of tile and switch up the veining or grain of a tile. This shower is a great example of both.
If you are planning a toilet compartment, the NKBA recommends a space about 36 by 66 inches, with a 32-inch-wide doorway. The absolute minimum would be 30 by 60 inches, which leaves just 15 inches of space on either side of the toilet rough-in. Tip: If you're worried about the bottom of your toilet scratching your floor tile or hardwood during installation, consider using scraps of Kerdi waterproofing membrane on the bottom of the toilet. Anything that will stick to the toilet bottom — extra peel-'n-stick tiles, scraps of linoleum, etc. — can work.
Pay Attention to Any Recesses or Compartments In this photo, the recessed shelves above the toilet allow for more headroom and save space. This clever use of space was no doubt made possible by good planning. Make sure your entire building crew knows about spaces like this ahead of time for a successful build. Tip: Check that your builders spray paint the framing around these niche locations before any wires, pipes or insulation is installed.
Decide on a Wall Mount or Floor Mount Installing a wall-mount toilet is a chore. All of them require a wall carrier to support the toilet, and some have very exact water supply positions, which allows for little flexibility in location. However, the look is seamless and modern and has some functional benefits as well. Tip: A standard toilet is 14 to 15 inches high from the finished floor to the top of the bowl (excluding the fold-down seat). Consider a higher measurement of 16 to 18 inches for your wall-mounted toilet if you plan on aging into your golden years. It may seem high now, but you'll be thankful for the added height later.
Plan Out Your Shower First If you’re planning on having a barrier-free shower near your toilet, consider installing a wall-mount toilet to make waterproofing measures simpler for your contractor.
Don’t make the toilet the first thing you see when open the door. Ask a bathroom designer what his or her best tried and true tip is, and this is what you’re likely to hear. The reasoning is simple. Oftentimes bathroom doors get left open, meaning that you or any guest in your home walking by will see the toilet — which, come on, isn’t the most aesthetically pleasing thing to look at. If you’re hoping for a spa-like vibe, putting the john front and center in the design can sort of kill the mood as you’re transitioning into the room. So, what should you make the focal point? Anything but the toilet. In this room, the designer hid the toilet behind a hutch-like cabinet wall.
Have more than one way of drying out your bathroom. Reducing mold and mildew begins with removing moisture. To do that it’s best to have a multifaceted approach: a great fan that vents to the outside (not into an attic) and an operable window.
Shower tile. Schmauder chose a double-hexagon ceramic tile for the shower floor. While picking a shower floor pattern to go with the floor tile in the rest of the bathroom, she mocked them both up side by side to make sure they would work together. Tip: To choose patterns that work together, she advises, find a common element that is echoed in some way, such as color or shape. Here the black-and-white and diamondesque shapes around the circles in the main floor tile play off the hexagons on the shower floor. The shower floor tiles “are rounded a bit, which also works well with the floor tile,” Schmauder says. She repeated the use of black Schluter strips in the shower to outline the floor tile and the niche, and in the corners of the shower walls. Drain. Schmauder recommends paying attention to the apparatus that goes around the shower drain (commonly chrome), in addition to the shower drain itself. “Unlike drains, they don’t seem to come in matte black yet, but I realized the plain white of PVC would work well with the double-hexagon tile,” she says. Shower floor tile: double hexagon, Floor & Decor Industrial by Schmauder Group Schmauder Group Niche. An extra-long niche has ple...
P-traps. Another key detail to note in the vanity is one that’s often an afterthought — the P-traps (pipes underneath the sinks). Schmauder made sure to find matte black P-traps that are a design asset; if you fail to pay attention to P-traps when designing a space, they can be an eyesore.
Vanity. Schmauder is a fan of using unexpected pieces for vanities; in this case she found a TV console. “This piece was easier to convert into a vanity in terms of plumbing, because we didn’t have to cut around drawers like we would have had to with a dresser,” she says. “And the storage it offers makes up for the loss of the linen closet.” The TV console is made of reclaimed fir with an antique gray finish and a black iron frame. It is 30 inches high. By using vessel sinks that are 5 inches high, Schmauder brought the total height up to 35 inches. She then mounted the faucets at 42 inches off the floor, leaving a comfortable amount of space for hand-washing.
When space is plentiful and the budget is ample, powder rooms can be indulgently luxurious, like this beautiful space. The plan below illustrates some dimensions that are suitable for more generous designs. You may have a cabinet and countertop custom designed and fabricated, and place the toilet so that it is more shielded from view than in a smaller room.
An electrical outlet must be installed with a listed ground-fault circuit interrupter (GFIC) or listed GFIC breaker that protects the circuit of that outlet. Outlets are required by some building codes to be placed within 36 in. (91 cm) of the outside edge of the sink and at an appropriate height for the configuration of the basin area. Contemporary Powder Room by Tracy Herbert Interiors, LLC Tracy Herbert Interiors, LLC Windows If a window is provided for ventilation, its area must be 5 percent of the square footage of the room or at least 1½ square feet (about 450 square cm). Mechanical ventilation can be used in place of a window and is common. The key is that the ventilation equipment must provide five air changes per hour to the exterior of the building, according to many current building codes in the U.S. All fans manufactured for this purpose will have indicated in their specifications how much air they can circulate.
It is also important to note that the wall behind toilets, and sometimes sinks, needs to be thicker than a standard wall framed with 2-by-4s. A 2-by-6 construction allows for plumbing with a 3-in. (8-cm) diameter to pass through the wall space, which is necessary for sewage.
Shower Ledges Instead of Niches Everyone needs a place in a shower for soap and shampoo bottles, and a niche does an adequate job. But niches are somewhat difficult to handle from a design and construction perspective, because they have to be recessed between wall studs. This requires extra planning and preparation. Meanwhile, you have to consider what you will use to tile the interior of the niche and how you will finish off its edges. That’s a lot of work for a small area that sometimes isn’t even big enough to hold large bottles of shampoo and conditioner. A shower ledge is much more straightforward and requires a build-out of only a few inches into the shower space. Run it along the length of your shower stall, as designer Katy Popple did here, and you’ve got tons of space for shower essentials. Cap it with a piece of your bathroom vanity countertop material and call it a day.
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