Bathrooms are hard. Hard to get motivated about, hard to decorate, and full of hard things, literally.
And yet, your bathroom is so important, in so much more than just a functional way. It’s both the first thing you see in the morning and the last thing before going to bed. It’s the place where your mood for the day is established, and where your wind-down to sleep begins.
For many of us, however, our bathrooms have become the forgotten child in our home’s decorating scheme, and are far too often a room that we simply fly in and out of in our haste to get on with the busyness of life. This week’s featured room makeover showcases just such a bathroom, one that is very typical of what we so often see here in the Midwest.
We began with this very moderately-sized, outdated master bathroom in a 1970’s ranch home, and a directive from its owners that the footprint of the room needed to remain unchanged, but everything else was fair game. These empty nesters were more than ready for an update, indicating that they yearned for a space which would be reflective of their new, more contemporary decorating style, a space that would feel serene but with a definite ‘wow’ factor.
For starters, we established a new color scheme of soft grays and blues, warmed that up with some creamy beige elements, and then punched it up with generous doses of crisp black and white. It’s the way that this seemingly incongruous combination of colors plays out which established the basis for this room’s successful finished look and feel.
Underfoot, the new natural stone floor tile provides real warmth to the room, both visually and literally. Its golden undertones dramatically warm up an otherwise cold color scheme, and the worn, tumbled texture of the stone adds a visual softness to the room. Literal warmth comes, however, from the radiant heat that the homeowners chose to put underneath the tile, which is a welcome gift to their feet on chilly mornings!
Next, our walls were stripped of their old ‘80’s wallpaper, newly textured and bathed in soft gray-blue paint. This color is what provides the serenity factor to the room, and balances out the crisp drama of the black and white elements which will be added later.
The old double vanity, mirrors and light fixtures needed to go. In their place, a sleek furniture-style vanity and trough sink are now set against a backdrop of glossy white subway tile, accented with an inset border of glass tiles in our featured colors.
Opposite the vanity wall, the old tub and shower surround were given new life as well. The bathtub was refreshed with a simple and relatively inexpensive reglazing process, and removing the fiberglass surround gave us a clean slate upon which to repeat our subway and glass tile combination. A custom shower curtain, in the grey-blue and beige colors, brings another element of softness to the room.
With the major functional areas of this bathroom established, what remained were the finishing touches of a window treatment and accessories.
The old traversing draperies at the window were replaced with a Hunter Douglas Silhouette shade. This not only functions beautifully to provide the privacy needed in the bathroom, but also lends visual softness and complements the contemporary look that we’re going for.
Brass towel bars and tissue holder have been replaced with sleek contemporary polished nickel ones, and a floating glass shelf and black glass-topped table now provide handy storage. Soft blue and white towels and a few carefully selected pieces of artwork add the finishing touches to this bathroom, which finally resides firmly in the 21st century.
Having developed and executed a careful plan that incorporated just the right balance of color, softness and drama, our homeowners say that their new bathroom certainly doesn’t seem like a hard thing to face each morning now!
Posts
No comments:
Post a Comment