Chris and I have always said that if we don’t feel 100% all-in excited about a project–both of us–then we probably haven’t found the solution yet. I think that’s been the tale with our primary bathroom as a whole. We feel excited about doing the project, but it’s been YEARS in the design phase because it just hasn’t clicked. We haven’t solved all of our pain points, until recently. I’ll get to that in just a minute, because WOW, exciting stuff. But before we do, I want to preface this by saying, no project is going to be perfect. Perfect is boring. I’m not looking for a perfect bathroom. (But spoiler, I think we’re gonna be pretty darn close.)
Before we start a project, we do always list out our pain points and there’s really no point in renovating unless you can address those pain points. Like, why spend the money to make something prettier if it still functions the same way. Imagine if we renovated our bathroom and kept the 28″ vanities. Ha! We started working with Jean Stoffer and her team a couple months ago and everything started clicking! She helped us address some issues that we couldn’t quite work out, and we didn’t want to compromise on, and it feels like everything is moving now.
Here are some of the design elements that will totally transform the primary bathroom:
- With our current bathroom vanities, our backs are toward the window, and it’s just the worst. We’re backlit all day. In Jean’s design, we’re going to have our vanities facing this large window. What a difference that will be! It feels obvious now, but we’re so happy we got here.
- We really wanted to fit a tub and a sit-down vanity. But no matter how we laid out the design ourselves, we could not seem to fit both. If you look at the drawing, Jean fit a little sit-down vanity right in the walkway section that cuts into the water closet. The doors open on the wall so I don’t have to scoot out when I want to open something from the drawer. That was so exciting.
- We decided to add pocket doors to our closets to enable them to stay contained. Usually in a small space, you don’t want a lot of doors cramping it up—right now we have no doors on the closets. But this will allow us to individualize the closets for Chris and me. If they’re behind closed doors, they don’t have to look so symmetrical! Plus we can maximize the space inside.
The last block, was the closets themselves are small, especially for this size of house. We have toyed with everything from expanding our house into our backyard to gain space or even started eyeing the study. Both options were too extreme. I was so grateful that we shared all this in Love Letter (sign up here so you don’t miss any!). We got a slew of ideas from you all, and a lot of the feedback talked about extending the floorplan somehow. And we couldn’t stop thinking about this idea…
Changing the Bathroom Footprint
Now, we don’t want to extend our house at all. BUT I think we are gonna extend the closets and make our bedroom smaller. Which feels crazy but also obvious!! It’s the only option really.
Floor Mirror | Chairs (vintage – similar) | Polly Ivory/Natural Rug
The downside of that is that the bay window will not be centered in the room any longer. We’re not going to cut into the window, but we’re going to take it 30 inches out from where it is now. I think that it’ll actually make our room feel even cozier. The mirror will not be on the wall anymore, but it could still be straight across from our bed. We’ll probably have to move the chandelier. But there’s still room at the end of the bed for the bench.
Right now there’s a lot of extra space in our bedroom. Some people find that luxurious (and I get it), but I’d rather have extra space in our closet than our bedroom. When we told Jean we would like to do that for the bathroom design, she said that it would help tremendously. So she’s expanded the closets and even expanded room around the vanity!
Just look at this layout if we expand into our bedroom 30 inches! Glorious!
The Plan for the Bathtub
One surprising thing about the bathroom remodel is that we’re planning to install an undermount tub instead of a freestanding tub. A lot of people right now are doing a freestanding tub. We’re opting for an undermount tub for a few reasons:
- 1 think the stonewear we’re going to mount it under will be really lovely.
- There are features you can get in an undermount tub that aren’t available in a clawfoot tub.
- You can get a larger tub when it’s undermounted (and we’re tall so….yeah).
To make it more of a spa experience, we’re interested in the bubble feature, but not a jetted tub. And I think we’re going to do a deck-mounted faucet in the back. I never thought in a million years I’d be getting an undermount tub (I mean, the freestanding tub we put into our Idaho Falls house was a dreammmm). I keep wondering, “Are we sure? Are we sure?” But…I’m pretty sure.
The Plan for the Bathroom Walls
One of our goals for this bathroom is for it to feel like a place where you want to hang out, which is kind of a funny thing to say about a bathroom. But we told Jean that we want the same finishes you would find anywhere else in the house. For the bathroom wall trim, we’re doing recessed panels, which is the inverse of our primary bedroom right next to it. There will be lots of accent lighting. All of the walls will have trim, but the baseboards will be stone so it’s really functional for a bathroom. I think it will be so pretty.
Since we have a dark bedroom, I really want the bathroom to be a light romantic counterpart to our moody bedroom. I’m even considering a light blush color for the wall paint! Right now our walls are lime green. I can’t even believe I’ve lived with them this long!! It feels so exciting to finally say goodbye to that color.
In the shower, we are mimicking the wall moldings—that there’s going to be tile creating insets and inside the insets there will be a smaller different tile. We’re mixing it even in the shower as the molding on the outside. It’s gonna be great.
The Plan for the Shower
Over the years, we’ve learned that we don’t like more glass in a shower than just a door. In one of our first bathroom remodels we did an all-glass shower enclosure. It looks great for a bit. But then it’s so hard to upkeep!! So this one, we just have the door as glass and then there are moldings all around it. It’ll have this beautiful traditional look.
I have always done a mix of gold and polished nickel for bathroom hardware, and I don’t see that changing for this bathroom. But I don’t know which will be the predominant one yet!! I’ve always leaned on more polished nickel for a bathroom—it feels really classic, and I just love that.
The Plan for the Bathroom Floor & Ceiling
We have gone back and forth on the floor between wood floors and tile floors. The rest of the first floor is all wood. Again, thinking about the transition going from our bedroom to the bathroom, it would be so showstopping to do tile. So that’s where we’re at.
We’re also getting rid of our vaulted ceiling! I don’t think a lot of people would think about doing that. But the ceiling in the bathroom vaults in so many different directions!! So we’re just going to make it a 10-foot ceiling. It will have straight, clean lines. That will allow us to add crown molding throughout the space and have a cutoff for the trim. Taller isn’t always better. Let’s have a straight ceiling!
The Plan for the Closet Doors
We decided to add pocket doors to our closets to enable them to stay contained. Usually in a small space, you don’t want a lot of doors cramping it up—right now we have no doors on the closets. But this will allow us to individualize the closets for Chris and me. If they’re behind closed doors, they don’t have to look so symmetrical! Plus we can maximize the space inside.
The Timeline for the Primary Bathroom Renovation
I can see us having everything ordered this year, and then the primary bathroom redesign would be the kickoff renovation project for 2025!! Right now we’re working on making final selections for finishes and making orders, and getting ready to start in January with demo. Our contractor says if everything is in place, they can get it done pretty quick!
Here are some posts on our current and recent primary bathroom renovations:
