How to Squeeze in a Bathroom

09 June 2011

So, bathrooms. Today's lesson will be how to squeeze a full family bathroom into a room which ought to be a cloakroom (on a good day).

I suppose I should have considered stealing some space from one of the bedrooms or perhaps just decided to opt for a shower room, but I am pitching this house as a family home and so a full bath is called for.

As the age of this house means that there was never a bathroom upstairs, it looks as though it has been shoe-horned into whatever space was available. It might have even been some sort of airing cupboard or an alcove. Personally I would have built an extension into the garden and had the bathroom downstairs, but what's done is done.

So I have been scouring the shops and online for the best options for a small bathroom. The first and most obvious thing was to find the smallest ever bath. In fact, we found one which is both slightly narrower and quite a bit shorter. It fits perfectly against the long wall.

The toilet is going to be one of these floating ones with the cistern hidden in the wall behind. I had to build the wall out slightly to accommodate the pipes for the bath anyway, so it makes sense to use that space for as much of the toilet as possible. Having the WC off the floor really makes the room look bigger.

The basin is a little different. I have gone for a round bowl sitting on a rectangular box cupboard. Because there is no space for any storage, I wanted to be sure that there was some cupboard space under the basin. Obviously the pipes are hidden in this box as well, but there is enough room for your typical bathroom essentials.

I couldn't find a basin cupboard which would fit into the tiny space I had in the corner, so I have had to build my own. I used basic MDF and will cover the entire cupboard in mosaic tiles including the top. It should look pretty good once it is all done.

Finally I have installed a shower over the bath. No surprises there. But we decided after many hours of thought that we would opt for a simple shower curtain rather than a shower screen. For a start, the size of the bath made it difficult to find a screen which worked well. Plus a screen requires room to open either into the shower or out into the room – neither of which we have. Sliding or fixed doors just would have looked wrong on such a short bath.

The other way to make the bathroom look less postage stamp-like is to get out the white tiles and paint. We have opted for clean lines and white walls. Not sure on the flooring yet, but it is likely to be a hard wearing vinyl. If this is a rented property we need to be sure it can put up with a range of tenants, so it is certainly basic – but clean and modern.

So this has kept me busy this week. I have done a few other one-off jobs for various clients this week, to keep the money ticking over. Claire has found her first client for her landscaping and has been working hard this week too. So the money situation is OK ish. For the time being at least!