Planning a Bathroom Renovation

 I like the thick wood shelf here. And of course we can't have a hanging sink. We need storage.

My new assignment is a bathroom renovation for mom's home office (which was originally a bedroom I shared with my sister when we were growing up). It's at least a 30 year old bathroom with beige marble tiles. It was renovated once during the lifetime of the house, when we were both away at college. I remember painting and doing artwork in this little room because our bedroom had wall-to-wall carpet.

Yup, it's about time we got a new look!  Okay, I can't post a photo of what it looks like now or mom will kill me, so these photos are all just ideas to get us in the mood.

So mom, take a look at these...

 

To start, this is a more traditional vanity and design. I think we should have a light counter top. I would go with a stone (maybe not a solid surface?--it doesn't match the rest of the house) but then finding a nice white stone is kinda hard here. I'll ask Pam what she'd suggest. I'm not too thrilled with the agglomerate stones available locally, unless they have better shades of white now. Or maybe you don't like white?

We shouldn't do a black/dark top. First of all, if this will be your everyday bathroom, we need the glow from the reflection of a light-colored counter top. Secondly, black is not advisable because the water leaves white marks on it if it's not wiped up right after.

This one is promising, with a light-colored solid surface top and ample storage below. But I would put open shelves under for your rolled hand towels. We should have two light fixtures on either side like this.

This is between traditional and modern, and very practical. Enough storage below. Real wood floor is totally out because it can't take the humidity here, but we could use porcelain tiles that look like wood. But I have figure out a nice termination between the bathroom and the shower stall. I've seen some installations where the wood-look tiles are also installed inside the shower and it looks a bit odd to me--wood isn't supposed to get soaking wet, so it mustn't be inside a shower (tiles or not!). The cool grey is a nice updated color scheme too.

By now you would be tired of vessel sinks so let's not do this. But I thought you might consider also the open shelf below? Open counters are nice when you have other places to store cleaning supplies. Less dark, damp places to maintain.

Okay, I'm not considering this at all, but I couldn't help adding this here because I love the color, and I'm sure it looks fabulous in real life. But a bit to impractical for our needs. I once stayed at a hotel that had a similar look for the vanity. This was at the Westin in Valencia.

For a hotel it was great, but a bit  too modern for the house no? Okay, tell me if you like anything here while I look for a few more. I already have ideas. I just know that we have to re-tile and re-do the vanity, which is practically everything in the bathroom.

All photos (except for the last one) are from the archives of this wonderful blog, Simplified Bee.