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Ideal bathroom?

KimJ

KimJ

Did you check in the refrigerator?
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Nov 28, 2009
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So next on our list of long overdue home projects is having our master bath remodeled. We will be eliminating the tub and replacing it with a bigger shower, turning the old shower area into a laundry sorting & line drying cabinet/closet thing (the washer and dryer are in a utility room that is a pass-through from the garage - no room for anything else), getting new vanities, adding more lighting, and just generally freshening and/or upgrading all of the finishes.

I have odd/specific preferences on some of the finishes and details, but am wide open to possibilities on others, and I'm getting completely overwhelmed with trying to settle on a style and make everything cohesive. The only thing DH cares about is the shower head and a sound system for music while showering :lol, and he is chomping at the bit to get things started, so I need to pick a direction soon! :spin

Have you ever remodeled a bathroom? Did you use a designer or pick everything yourself? Anything you love or hate in a bathroom design, especially regarding functionality/practicality? Help me out!... Or make me even more confused! :lol
 
Yes, I had mine "spruced up" but you wouldn't like it. It is small. Long and skinny bathroom. My bathroom is basically a counter from door to wall on the right side. The left side had a tub and a toilet. The tub was replaced with a walk-in shower. My house was built in the 1960's and back then there were no "master suites". I would like to have my laundry area on the main floor (in the basement) but I don't have room for it. The only possibility is to take a 5 foot closet in the hallway but I do hate to lose the closet space. So for now I deal with it. The one good thing Mom chose to do with the bathroom was to put a laundry chute (really just a hole in the floor in the cabinet) to the basement. Just throw the clothes down.

I had a company here in town that specifically does kitchens and bathrooms do it (they did my kitchen the next month). I was given options by them for the various things. They just put together things that went together nicely and I chose from what they had shown me. The one thing I didn't like was the shower head I had chosen from their options. It didn't have enough pressure for me so I went to Lowe's and found one that I had them put in instead. They took the price of the shower head off the final bill but did charge me a restocking fee which was a lot less than the price of the shower head!
 
I've never remodeled, but I picked everything out for our 2 bathrooms when we built our home 2 years ago. We don't have a bathtub in either bathroom - just big showers with not much of a "lip" to step over. I love our showers - they're molded and have lots of shelves, and other nooks and crannies. Neither bath is really big, but we have lots of storage. I love my floors - they're ceramic but look like wood planks - and they're light - very LOW maintenance. They don't clean themselves, Kiana @LoveItScrapIt but they're the next best thing. :giggle:giggle They're the most low-maintenance floors I've ever had. There's a big closet in there and I hung damask draperies and tie them back instead of putting doors up. If you don't have a lot of room, think vertical.
 
We remodelled the bathroom 2years ago (,we had nothing better to do since we were in part lock down lol ) took the old bath tub down and made a biggish shower. I love it ! The floor and walls were always ceramic tile ( we did it when we moved in 20 years ago.) So that was easy since we had some left and could continue the title where the bathtub had been.
The shower has hardly any lib about 2 cm,so you just walk in ,and the "outer " wall is a single piece of solid glass, no door,no groves to collect dirt and get mouldy,no hinges. ,we built a solid bench /shelf big enough to sit on if need be at one end and tiled it. The showerhead is a rain shower,and we have jets too.....
In short any thing a person with "wonkey" knees could wish for , and it looks great too.
 
We never remodeled either. We have a 2 story home with 3 bedrooms and 2.5 baths... 2 full up and 1/2 down.

In our master we have a stall shower and garden tub.. and in the other full bath is an all in one molded tub/shower. Our bathroom on the main floor is just a toilet and sink. .. Our washer/dryer is in a utility closet across from the main 1/2 bath down stairs.. it is the space that has the area to go out to the garage so it is perfect and out of the way from everything.

I would think if you have multiple bathrooms one should have a tub for resale value, as people buying that have children would like a tub.

For me, I don't care for baths so that would be a non issue, and I would be fine with just the shower, but resale I would think for a guest / main bath a tub shower combo is best.

I love the double sinks in our master.

Good luck with your reno!
 
Sounds like fun Kim! Good luck! We remodeled our master bath in our last home. We hired someone to do the solid surface shower and counter top and hired another person to do the cabinets. The worst decision I made was to do one sink instead of two because I wanted more drawer space. The other bad decision I made was choosing a faucet that opened on top because it had to be cleaned constantly. The best decision was making the counter top tall-ish so there was more storage.
 
@cfile I agree about having a tub for resale value. That is the one thing that is not good since I redid my bathroom. I only have the one so no tub at all. In the 5 years since it was done there have been maybe 5 times that I wanted a tub. But I quite often would trip getting out of the tub when I had it. The one good thing though is that the counter was right there to catch me. The area between the tub area and counter is about 2.5 feet. Heck, I can sit on the toilet with the lid down and get my essential oils out of the drawer to put on my feet every morning. :)

But I quite honestly don't see a family ever buying my house. It is only 1400 sq ft so small by today's standards. It does have 3 bedrooms and a 1400 sq ft basement that is unfinished so if a family would buy it, they could do something downstairs. There used to be a metal square shower down there along with a flush-up toilet but they caused me more problems so I had them taken out. I have thought about having a bathroom put in down there that would include a tub but at this time have other things I want done.
 
@HavaDrPepper If there is one thing re 2 story houses that should be mandatory is that there is a full bath downstairs. I love my 1/2 bath, but if something happens to either one of us where we cannot walk up and down the stairs, we would need to stay down and there is no shower. That is a bit of an issue for sure.
 
cfile said:
@HavaDrPepper If there is one thing re 2 story houses that should be mandatory is that there is a full bath downstairs. I love my 1/2 bath, but if something happens to either one of us where we cannot walk up and down the stairs, we would need to stay down and there is no shower. That is a bit of an issue for sure.
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The house my dad lived in down in NC was 2 story. Since it was a newer build, it had a master suite with a full bathroom downstairs. It had the half bath right inside the front door (other side of wall was the master bath). Upstairs it had 3 bedrooms and a full bathroom for all to share. It was big for 2 people but great for when they had family stay. They never went upstairs except to freshen up before company came to visit. Lots of privacy for them and any visitors they had. If I remember right, her laundry area was a small room off of the kitchen so visitors could use it if needed without going into the master bedroom area. Not a bad house but I really love my single story house. Steps can be hard on the knees!
 
HavaDrPepper said:
I had a company here in town that specifically does kitchens and bathrooms do it (they did my kitchen the next month). I was given options by them for the various things. They just put together things that went together nicely and I chose from what they had shown me.
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That sounds like a great way to do it. We have a contractor friend who we will probably have do the work, and he usually points us to suppliers he works with, but we generally pick out the actual product ourselves. It's kind of overwhelming.

LoveItScrapIt said:
Never remodeled one. But my ideal bathroom is one that CLEANS ITSELF.....does that exist. rofl
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LOL One of the things I'm going for is what I hope with be easy to clean!

Cherylndesigns said:
IWe don't have a bathtub in either bathroom - just big showers with not much of a "lip" to step over. I love our showers - they're molded and have lots of shelves, and other nooks and crannies. Neither bath is really big, but we have lots of storage. I love my floors - they're ceramic but look like wood planks - and they're light - very LOW maintenance.
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I am hoping to go "zero entry" or as low of a curb as possible on the shower. We don't plan on ever moving, and "aging in place" features would be helpful. I would be fine with a molded shower, but we have to work with a large window in the shower, and I don't know if that would be an option. Tile floors are one of my weird things I don't like... beautiful, but too cold and hard underfoot. We have sheet vinyl now, and I'm fine with it except that it's a fairly large room which means a seam in the middle of the floor. About 10 years ago the seam started curling, and then curling more, and then cracking. We have a big throw rug over the seam now just to be able to walk without hurting your feet. I'm considering some waterproof wood-look vinyl plank, but I haven't seen it in person yet.

Nemla said:
... the "outer " wall is a single piece of solid glass, no door,no groves to collect dirt and get mouldy,no hinges. ,we built a solid bench /shelf big enough to sit on if need be at one end and tiled it. The showerhead is a rain shower,and we have jets too.....
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I don't know if we can get away with no door on the shower with the shape we will need to do, but I do like the thought of it being that much easier to clean. I am waffling between a built-in bench and just getting a teak bench that we could position wherever we needed it. I've never used a shower that has the body jets - I'm intrigued by them though!

cfile said:
Our washer/dryer is in a utility closet across from the main 1/2 bath down stairs.. it is the space that has the area to go out to the garage so it is perfect and out of the way from everything.

I would think if you have multiple bathrooms one should have a tub for resale value, as people buying that have children would like a tub. ...

I love the double sinks in our master.
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Our washer/dryer positioning sounds similar to yours. My issue with the laundry is dealing with the dirty clothes waiting to be washed and the ones that need to be line-dried after. We perpetually have either big baskets of unsorted laundry or five or six big piles of sorted dirty laundry scattered around the master bath, and two folding hanging racks that are out with things drying on them 80% of the time.

We have three full baths, and the other two each have tub/shower combos, so no issue with resale getting rid of our tub. Kaylee does take baths in theirs once in a while, but ours hasn't been used in at least a decade. It just collects dust and random junk!

DH and I have separate vanities now and I am firm on keeping it that way. DH offered to share a double vanity with me, but I told him no way - he is way too messy! :lol

umyesh said:
The other bad decision I made was choosing a faucet that opened on top because it had to be cleaned constantly. The best decision was making the counter top tall-ish so there was more storage.
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What is a faucet that opens on top? I definitely want taller vanities. Mine currently is the low type with open space in the center to be able to sit down and do makeup or whatever. I have never once used it that way. Such a waste of space. And since I am tall, that makes the counter height extra ridiculous.
 
Thanks for all of the responses so far! Keep 'em coming! :-)

Does anyone have vanities that are built to look like furniture with feet and space underneath? That seems to be what's "in" right now, and they are so pretty, but all I can think is how much harder it would be to clean under there than a traditional toe-kick vanity.

If anyone watches No Demo Reno (Jenn Todryk aka The Rambling Redhead) on HGTV, then you have seen something very similar to the style of my current bathroom/home. It's shot in this area, and I get so much deja vu in the "before" footage of almost every house! :giggle I've been paying extra attention to the bathroom projects to try to get ideas for mine. :-)
 
Kim, ours are about "zero entry" - I love it! They're not great for kids - when our grandson was here for 2 weeks, he made a royal mess every time he took a shower. Hahaha They're great if it's just for adults.
 
Nope to the vanities with feet. Actually my cabinets in the bathroom are the same brand as the ones in the kitchen. It was strange at first since they are the same height as the kitchen cabinets and my previous cabinets were a couple inches lower. 5 years later and I'm used to it. My mom was all about storage when they built this house so that is why the cabinet goes from door to outer wall. Lots of drawer space. It was supposed to have 2 sinks and she said "nope". She wanted the extra drawer space so the sink ended up in the middle. So I kept the same thing when I had it redone. I prefer that to something on the wall. I've got 8 drawers, the area under the sink and another area that was supposed to have a shelf and I said no. The corresponding door on the other end of the counter is the "laundry chute".

Oh, to add. I have tile in my shower. It is not cold at all. I have a stationary glass pane and a glass door. Room is too small not to have one. I do have to step up about 3 inches but then the shower floor is down about 2 inches. Had to have something to keep the water from flowing onto the floor, you know. A bench was built in along the stationary glass panel.
 
Cherylndesigns said:
Kim, ours are about "zero entry" - I love it! They're not great for kids - when our grandson was here for 2 weeks, he made a royal mess every time he took a shower. Hahaha They're great if it's just for adults.
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When my mom redid her bathroom she had zero entry and there was always quite a lot of water on the bathroom floor after a shower, no matter who used it. I don't know if they didn't slope the floor correctly or what, since I'm assuming that's not normal. :shrug

HavaDrPepper said:
Nope to the vanities with feet. Actually my cabinets in the bathroom are the same brand as the ones in the kitchen. It was strange at first since they are the same height as the kitchen cabinets and my previous cabinets were a couple inches lower. 5 years later and I'm used to it. My mom was all about storage when they built this house so that is why the cabinet goes from door to outer wall. Lots of drawer space. It was supposed to have 2 sinks and she said "nope". She wanted the extra drawer space so the sink ended up in the middle. So I kept the same thing when I had it redone. I prefer that to something on the wall. I've got 8 drawers, the area under the sink and another area that was supposed to have a shelf and I said no. The corresponding door on the other end of the counter is the "laundry chute".

Oh, to add. I have tile in my shower. It is not cold at all. I have a stationary glass pane and a glass door. Room is too small not to have one. I do have to step up about 3 inches but then the shower floor is down about 2 inches. Had to have something to keep the water from flowing onto the floor, you know. A bench was built in along the stationary glass panel.
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One thing I ran across in all of my Googling was that ergonomically the best height for a general use countertop is 3"-4" below the elbow. I'm curious what that would come out to; I have no idea what DH's and my elbow heights are. ;)

Sounds like a smart location for the chute. We are in a one-story concrete slab foundation house, so no chute for us.

Yeah, I think the shower floor will have to be tile. Our current one is some sort of molded fiberglass or something like that, but I don't know that we could get one in the size we'll be doing. My no tile underfoot thing is more for the floor of the room. I've never had that in a house I've lived in (other than our foyer, but it's mostly covered by a big rug), but it's in every hotel bathroom, and I'm just not a fan. I wish that wasn't a particularity for me, because it eliminates a lot of gorgeous options. Of course, in my current state of overwhelm, eliminating options might be a good thing. :lol
 
@KimJ The floor that got replaced was tile and I never thought it was cold. The floor in there now was put in 6 years before I redid the bathroom and I think it is a viny tilel. The previous tiles were 2" square (on a mesh) and had grout in between them. After 40 some years, those were nasty looking in some places (like behind the toilet where it was hard to get to to clean). So I went with a larger size vinyl? tile. I kept that when I redid the bathroom 5 years ago since they were still in good shape.

As far as the counter... I'm only 5' tall. I could rest my boobs on the counter when I'm leaning over the sink to brush my teeth or wash my face if I wanted. LOL
 
We are wanting to remodel our bathroom to accommodate my changing needs with my chronic back pain and the intermittent issues with my legs not wanting to work.

:badmood

My mom fell 3 weeks ago and fractured her right knee. She has a walk in shower with a short lip but even that is difficult to maneuver right now with a wheelchair or a walker. So Jay and I have been talking and I would love to have the zero entry shower. That way no matter what happens in the future, I will be able to have full access to a shower. I get really cranky if I can't be clean. :crazy

Other than that, Jay and I are both tall, so we both want a vanity that has more height.
 
I have never done space underneath a vanity because of the cleaning aspect.

I’ll try to attach a photo of the faucet that’s open on top. I don’t know how else to explain it haha the water comes out like a waterfall which is pretty but our hard water deposits are not pretty.
 
Your plan sounds exactly like what we want to do Kim. ...and I have wanted to do since we moved in over 19 years ago. :giggle We have a giant jacuzzi tub across the entire end our our long narrow bathroom, and nobody uses it. The kids used to fill it up with hot water after they played in the sprinklers when they were little, but now it just collects dust. Then we have a tiny square stand up shower that my hubby and I use every day. I dream of having a seat or step that I can use when I shave my legs. Currently I have to balance on one leg. Blargh! We also one have one sink because the guy that owned our house before us was single. So dumb!

Kim, have you ever heard of Houzz? They have piles and piles of photos of any time of house renovation you could dream up. It's super handy to browse through for ideas!

https://www.houzz.com/photos/bathroom-ideas-phbr0-bp~t_712
 
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