The bathroom renovation roundup

A big thank you to everyone who took the time to share their thoughts on my This or That series the past few weeks. Your feedback helped a lot! At this point, almost all the decisions have been made, most of the items have been bought, and the building permit is attached to our front door. Why we need to let everyone know we’re doing a bathroom reno, I have no idea. Anyway, here’s a roundup of what’s going on in the bathroom…

Fixtures

MAAX Ambrosia F freestanding tub with air jets and chromatherapy lights. Can’t wait for a relaxing soak in this baby!

Toto Aquia wall-mounted toilet. I hope it stays firmly attached to the wall!

Two American Standard Studio sinks. We have these in our current vanity – I love the combination of linear & curvy.

Faucets

I’ve loved the Virage series from Brizo for a long time. So I’m so thrilled that Brizo very generously provided the Virage vanity, tub, and shower faucets & jets. THANK YOU BRIZO! Click here to read more about these gorgeous Virage faucets, and click here to learn more about some of Brizo’s other super-sexy faucets.

Tiles

This was by far the toughest decision to make. I had my heart set on blue moonstone floor tiles, but so many factors came into play that moved me away from moonstone and over to these Midgley & West 12” x 24” Volcano “Nero” porcelain tiles.

Bianco Carrara marble mosaic accent tile to break up the dark floor.

The winning layout, and it’s Squirt-approved too :-)

On the other hand, I knew I wanted these “Wave” tiles from Ceragres for the shower walls as soon as I saw them!

I literally anguished over the accent & niche tiles before finally settling on these pretty small blue mosaics, also from Ceragres.

 

Countertop and shower trim

This Super White quartzite is absolutely stunning. Thanks to Steph at The Granite Gurus for the inspiration! If you’re looking for an alternative to Bianca Carrara marble, this is one of Steph’s recommendations.

Vanity

Hubby is going to build a double vanity in this style. I’ll  be painting it with Annie Sloan Chalk Paint in Paris Grey and Old White, just like this table that I painted a few weeks ago. I’m still on the hunt for ring pulls…

Image via Houzz | Design by Artistic Designs for Living, Tineke Triggs

Lighting

Right from the start, I knew I wanted a bubble-style chandelier. Two of these Modern 4-Light Rain Tear Drops Crystal Chandeliers by Evrasvet will hang in the center of the room.

Vanity lighting

It was a tough decision, but wall sconces win! After chatting a bit with Kelly Berg at Arte Styling, I realized that hanging pendants would be overkill with the two chandeliers – like Kelly said, it could look a bit like stalactites hanging on a cave!

Images via Pinterest and Houzz {I can’t find the original sources}

Shower bench

Teak bench wins! It was a tough call, but in the end, the warmth of the wood and the versatility of a free-standing bench won out. Hubby is also going to make the bench… eventually!

Images via Houzz | Designs by The Wood Shop of Avon and Andrea Schumacher

We still haven’t settled on the vanity mirror(s), but that’s something that can be decided at the end of the reno. And the niches on the wall behind the tub are still up in the air – that decision needs to to be made soon!

Our bathroom reno plan has been in the works since June, and hubby is FINALLY just about ready to start the demo. He’s finishing up relocating heating ducts in the basement ceiling first – now that it’s getting down to 0 degrees at night, it would be really nice to have some heat in the house! Once that’s done, it’ll be full steam ahead with the bathroom. CAN’T WAIT!

Bathroom tiles: The final verdict

Last week, I was fit to be tiled with tile samples for the master bathroom coming out the ying yang. After reading all your great feedback (THANKS!) and talking with glass artists Pam & Oded Ravek, I’ve made my final written-in-stone decision :-) The floor tiles were already a definite right from the start – 12” x 24” moonstone (the samples in the picture below are 3” x 6”). They’ll be accented with a band of Bianca Carrara mosaic tile.

Bianca Carrara mosaic tile from Ceragres | Moonstone tile from Saltillo

The white wavy tile was a big hit with everyone – it’s going on the walls in the shower surround. The striped tile that I absolutely LOVE will go into the niches in the shower and the wall behind the tub. Then I made a total change from the accent tiles I was considering – I’m going to use a clear glass & marble mosaic, bordered on each side with a steely blue glass pencil tile.

Striped tile from Saltillo | White wavy tile from Ceragres | Glass tiles Glazzio Tiles 

Here’s a close-up of the glass mosaic. The textured glass tiles have an iridescent finish, which adds a nice little touch of bling (I’m all about the bling!). The marble tiles will tie in with the marble on the floor.

And it just so happens that this colour scheme works perfectly with my blue glass floats :-)

Once we sort out the tiles for the shower floor, that’ll be one more thing to cross off the list. This past week, we picked up two American Standard Studio sinks…

And a Toto Aquia wall-hung toilet…

I’ve decided not to do wainscoting, Although I love the look of tiled wainscoting, I realized that there really won’t be enough wall space to properly showcase wainscoting. And buying all that tile would be expensive.

Hubby plans to start demoing the bathroom around September first. Can’t wait!

Woot! It's master bathroom makeover time!

I'm guest posting over at Olga's blog, Stardust - Decor & Style today (Friday, June 22nd). Well, it's actually still June 21st here, but Olga is in Greece, so it's already Friday where she is :-)

Click here to check out some of my DIY and room before & afters.

Did you see the Homestyler bathroom layouts that I posted last week?

 

  

Well, I'm seriously stoked because hubby FINALLY agreed to gutting & redoing our master bathroom.

Can I get a WOOT!

Did he give in to my 11 years of nagging? Nope. All it took was a real estate agent assessing our house to walk into the room and say "Oh, this all has to go." If I'd known, I would have called a real estate agent  ages years ago!

Anyway - in all honesty, it's not the worst bathroom in the world. It's a good size, but the corner tub literally takes up 1/4 of the room, and we never even use it. We also never use the bidet. Does anyone use a bidet? The only things we've done with ours is use it as a dog water fountain and for party entertainment.

Guest: "Look! It's a bidet! What's a bidet for?"
Me: "I have no idea - but let's see how high we can get the water to shoot up!"
Everyone: "Oooooooh, cooooooool!"

via schwingeninswitzerland

This is what the bathroom looked like when we moved in (minus the Hollywood light that we replaced). That green marble tile around the tub & shower is also on the floor. I mean, seriously, could a room be any greener?

So anyway, all the ugly is going and lots of pretty is coming in. YAY! I'm totally inspired by the bathroom makeover that Sarah & Tommy did on Sarah 101 last week. Coincidentally, they had a lot of green to ditch too.

via HGTV.ca

I LOVE the moonstone tiles on the floor. I went to Saltillo to check them out, but according to the lady at the store here in Ottawa, the biggest size they come in is 3" x 6". The tiles in Sarah & Tommy's bathroom are definitely bigger than that. Well, one way or another, we'll definitely be putting moonstone in the bathroom because hubby and I both love it. Well, I love it. He doesn't really care one way or the other ;-)

If we don't use moonstone on the floor, we'll go with honed carrera marble (1) with some sort of accent, possibly Matrix Multi Gray Marble Mosaic (4). Mini Sunflower Marble Mosaic in Moonstoone & Thassos (2) will be the accent tile in the shower and in the niche behind the tub (like Sarah & Tommy's "nooche"). I'm also planning to do "wainscoting" with 3" x 6" honed carrera marble (3).

♥ ♥ ♥

via DecorPad

And hubby doesn't know this yet, but I want to replace the door & window trim with carrera marble too. I totally love this look!

via Houzz, photo by Cynthia Lynn Photogrpahy

 

These are the PARA paint colours I've narrowed the choices down to. I pulled them from the colours in the moonstone. Do you have a favourite?

 

Lindsay at Little House Blog considered these three marble alternatives for her kitchen countertops. I'm thinking any one of them would work well as the vanity countertop in our bathroom. I particularly like Corian "Rain Cloud".

 

Speaking of the vanity - hubby says he's going to make it. UGH! He does good work, but he's sooooooo slow! I've never seen anyone think and analyze and plan so much!

I love, love, love the Virage faucet from Brizo. I want, want, want polished nickel Virage faucets in our bathroom, please!

 

The shower design is still in the works, but it'll be big and glass and have body jets and maybe a rain shower head. You might never get me out of it!

via Craigslist Tips and Tricks

 

I've always wanted a free-standing tub - now's my chance! I love the design on this tub from WetStyle's IMAGE-in collection. I saw their tubs at IDS12 - they're just beautiful, and the finish is so smooth and feels amazing.

There's definitely going to be a chandelier for some bling, as well as scones above the vanity and some pot lights. I'm thinking something along the lines of this chandelier, which looks a bit like water drops.

Alexandra from Bellacor

And at the non-blingy end of things, every bathroom needs a toilet. We're planning to go with a wall-mounted Toto, which will take up less space than a traditional toilet. Plus there's less surface area to clean :-) Does anyone have a wall-mounted toilet? I'm just wondering how securely they attach to the wall...

Toto Aquia from amazon.com

So that's my vision for the room. Whether or not it comes together the way I'm hoping remains to be seen. I have to narrow down some choices, do some budget calculations, and start making some concrete decisions so we can get this party started! I'm sure compromises will be made along the way, but getting hubby to agree to the new layout was a major coup :-) The power of a real estate agent and 11 decorators who ALL chose the same layout from the four I showed them. Thank you, ladies! :-)

Don't forget to enter my giveaway - Blurb is offering one lucky JAX does design reader the opportunity to create and publish your very own book! Click here for all the details.