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Bathroom Design Ideas for Small Bathrooms

February 28, 2013 in Bathroom Tips, Guides


Small bathrooms can be a design challenge for even the most experienced designers. Luckily, the market is full of innovative solutions to small space issues.

Combination units

One way to solve a lack of space is to find bathroom units that serve more than one purpose. Some of the best bathroom designs for small bathrooms use combination units such as showers over baths, or basins with storage space below.

Reducing the pieces

Another solution in many bathroom designs for small bathrooms is to determine what isn’t needed in the room. For some people, there’s no need to have a bath in every bathroom. Showers can be a great space saver in small bathrooms, and can also save water and money.

Wall mounted units can also help reduce the space used in the bathroom. Wall mounted or back to wall style toilets have a smaller projection, meaning they leave you with more floor space. They also hide the cistern and pipes within the wall, giving a tidier appearance.

Creative storage

One of the things that can make a bathroom seem smaller is clutter. Storage solutions for small bathrooms might need to be a bit more creative than that for larger bathrooms. Some ideas include high shelving, allowing you to keep items like towels out of the main bathroom area.

Other bathroom design ideas for small bathrooms include inset storage. By building storage into the walls, you don’t lose any valuable floor space. Such storage can also help give a place to smaller items, such as toothbrushes and shavers.

Dividing the space

A small bathroom might make you think that everything needs to be open, but a surprisingly effective option is to put in privacy walls. These short walls can be great for separating the toilet from the rest of the room. This can give the sense of a larger space, and can also add functionality and the ability for more than one person to use the room at a time.

Hide the door

A great bathroom design idea for small bathrooms is to do away with the hinged door. Using a sliding door can allow you to use the full area within the bathroom. While hinged doors require clearance for the door to swing open into, a sliding door stays flat against the wall. Sliding doors make it possible to add a bit more storage space, or can even slide open into the back wall of a shower enclosure.

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Luxury bathroom suites

February 12, 2013 in Bathroom Tips, Guides

Total bathroom luxury is within easy reach, even if you don’t have a luxury budget. With well-designed bathroom suites, it’s possible to get a great look for a good price.

Luxury bathing

Top quality materials and excellent design are two key features for any luxury bathroom furniture. Bigger bathrooms can benefit from larger furniture, such as a free standing bath. In modern or traditional styles, a free standing bath can be a real statement piece.

Another part of a luxury bathroom suite is the whirlpool bath. If a free standing bath won’t work or isn’t your taste, a whirlpool bath can be an ultimate luxury. With models ranging from 8 to a whopping 28 jets, whirlpool baths are available in a wide variety of shapes, sizes, and prices.

These baths can reduce stress and relax your muscles with their massaging effects. Some styles also feature air jets that work alongside the more traditional whirlpool just systems.

Luxury showers 

One luxury shower trend is the wet room. By waterproofing the entire suite, there’s no need for a shower enclosure. This allows for a great open plan, which makes any size room feel spacious. Wet rooms can be finished in high end materials, too, making them a stunning room.

If a wet room isn’t right for your luxury bathroom suite, there are walk-in shower enclosures, which screen the shower from the rest of the room, and more traditional enclosure styles. Large shower enclosures are a part of many luxury bathroom suites, as they also allow for the installation of body jets.

Shower head styles also allow for a luxury finish to a bathroom suite. Whether you prefer a large wall or ceiling mounted shower head or a shower rail system, there are plenty of luxury choices.Shower rail systems also offer the ability to adjust the shower head to a variety of heights, and the shower heads are easy to remove for even more control. Some models also offer a multi-mode handset for an even more customised showering experience.

Luxury toilets and basins

When planning luxury bathroom suites, it’s also important to consider the toilets and basins. While mixing and matching styles can help with some looks, many luxury suites benefit from using pieces from the same collection. It also ensures that your pieces work together, both in style and function.

Luxury doesn’t have to fit into a specific style, though. Modern luxury can be found in collections like the Rak Summit toilet and basin. These pieces have sleek lines that look great in any modern style of bathroom. For more traditional looks, the Windsor collection’s ornamentation can give a luxury bathroom suite a classical style.

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DIY Projects To Improve Your Home

April 27, 2012 in Bathroom Tips, Guides, Off Topic

When it comes to making your home more inviting and liveable there are lots of quick and easy DIY jobs you can do to make your home more welcoming and pleasant. Whether it is to aid resale value, ensure that you get a quick sale when you put it on the market or to make it more attractive for yourself when you come home from a long day at work, doing any of these suggested projects will make a huge difference.  Although large renovations may make the greatest difference, they are both time consuming and costly. They can also cause massive disruption to the home, putting a room out of use for days at a time. These quick, easy and cheap fixes will also make a large difference, but for a fraction of the cost and in much less time.

1. Crown Molding

Adding a crown molding is a simple project that can be done for most homes. This involves adding strips of decorative wood at the intersection of the wall and the ceiling. Depending on the value of the wood, this project can be very inexpensive but can effectively add a touch of elegance to any room. There are many crown molding designs to choose from and it depends on how much you are willing to invest.

2. Simple Kitchen Remodeling

While this may sound expensive, this does not have to be as elaborate and costly. This may only involve repainting the kitchen cabinets and changing the cabinet handles. Attractive lighting fixtures can also be added to change the mood of the kitchen. Swapping old furniture with more modern items from other rooms of from thrift shops can update the look of your kitchen without having to spend much.

3. Adding a Backsplash

If a backsplash is not yet installed, it is a worthwhile investment to add one. Not only does it make the kitchen more appealing, it also protects the walls from water and food materials that can deteriorate the paint. This prevents additional cost of future repainting and gives texture to the space.

4. Bathroom Flooring

Flooring can sometimes be the best way to upgrade the value of the room. Adding neutral bathroom flooring using inexpensive but elegant materials like decorative concrete or attractive ceramic tiles can certainly add a stylish touch to the bathroom. These should be chosen to match the existing furniture and fixture of the room to create a harmonious ensemble. Work out whether your bathroom is modern, or features traditional pieces such as freestanding baths and choose your decoration accordingly.

5. Replace the Front Door

The front door makes the first impression of your homes. This should be as attractive and elegant as possible. Using recycled hardwood with natural finishes can give this a classic touch without being costly. Some opt for doors with windows fitted with decorative glasses. This can be very elegant and versatile.

Home improvement projects can be easily done on weekends. This can also be a time for family bonding with every member pitching in to help. These simple DIY projects can be a first step to doing larger but easy renovations like adding a patio or a sunroom. And numerous studies have shown that improving the bathroom and kitchen are some of the surest ways to add value to any home.

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Tiling As A Finishing Touch For The Bathroom

April 25, 2012 in Bathroom Tips, Guides

When it comes to adding the finishing touch to a bathroom, or quickly changing the whole look of the room, the bathroom tile really comes into its own. Available in a seemingly infinite number of designs, you can find the perfect tile for your room, regardless of what look and theme you are going for. Of course, when faced with such a large choice, it is easy to get over-faced: this is where it is often a good idea to look at showrooms, magazines and sites online to find inspiration.

With such a wide range available, it is possible to combine tiles to perfectly suit the layout of the room and your own personal tastes. You can use tiles for accents, to serve as borders on a large space or to bring colour and contrast to existing designs. By choosing your tiles according to what colours and textures go together you can create nearly any effect you please while ensuring that the surface remains durable and waterproof.

Of course, when choosing your tiles, you first have to consider the budget you have available as well as what space you are looking to cover. by shopping around you will find that you can often get more for your money than you had initially thought, as well as coming across a large range of tiling that you may not have considered. It is often a good idea to talk to suppliers as they will have ideas that you don’t as well as practical advice and tips that can save you time as well as limiting problems that you may face.

Adding Colour

An effective and ,at the same time, affordable way to add more colours to a bathroom floor is to use colourful grouts. For white ceramic bathroom tiles, use brown or grey grout as it adds more depth in your design. In addition, using mosaic tiles also creates the same effect. In case you already have a very simple design, you can always use mosaic tiles to add more flair to the design.

Be Creative with Shapes and Sizes

Lining bathroom tiles is the most common design. If you want something different, why not turn some tiles around in order to create diamond shapes. More than that, you can also insert more brightly colored tiles. Let your imagination take the lead when you start designing using bathroom tiles. You may also get more ideas from books and magazines. Many homeowners also share their experiences and tips. They usually warn others not to use a particular colour or texture. Use their experience to guide you through your project and also highlight potential pitfalls.  Some research will make sure that you save both time and money later.

Whether you want to do this by yourself or hire a professional, always remember that bathroom tiles designs should be carefully planned if you want to create a unique and beautiful bathroom for you and your family. Graph paper is often helpful when looking at different layouts and working out what scale to use and what shapes and colours go well alongside one another.

By planning, shopping around and taking your time you can make your bathroom look beautiful. Tiles give you versatility and the ability to create nearly any look that you want. Whether you have a sleek, modern bathroom or a rustic, traditional bathroom including a freestanding bath, you can always create the perfect look using tiling.

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Bathroom Design Disasters To Avoid With Proper Preparation

February 3, 2012 in Bathroom Tips, Guides, Toilets

Murphy’s Law, while annoying and pessimistic, is usually true: “anything that can go wrong, will.” Bathroom design is no exception to the law. Luckily, knowing what to do and how, as well as taking the necessary precautionary steps, can still do quite a bit to prevent disaster. Here are seven mistakes most people make in bathroom design and (hopefully) how you can avoid them.

The biggest and most common mistake is improper installation of hardware and fixtures. Everything from the shower to the overhead light needs to be installed correctly, you could have some costly and possibly dangerous mistakes.

Miscalculating your budget is another very common mistake made in bathroom design. Sometimes this comes from not realizing the actual cost of the supplies, but more often than not it happens because of unforeseen events or mishaps. To prevent this, set your budget to what you believe it “should” be, and then add an extra 15 – 20% as a cushion against unforeseen expenses. Although you may have chosen one of our many cheap bathroom suites, you still have to pay to have it installed and deal with all those incidental costs that you didn’t originally bargain for. As you are designing or redesigning, you may come across mold, faulty electrical wiring, or old plumbing can crop up and cause you to spend more than you had planned – leaving you to cut back on those little luxuries you had wanted!

Insufficient ventilation – It can be very easy to get caught up in the artsy side of designing a bathroom and forget some of the basics of building a functional one. A bathroom needs to have adequate ventilation and lighting or can quickly become impractical or dangerous. Improper lighting can lead to falls once the shower steam builds up and it is hard to see, and improper ventilation means your bathroom is just begging for mold. Not to mention the need now and then for some fresh air to get in!

Improper space allocation – There is always a mix of science and art when it comes to using a space wisely, and bathroom design is no different. Small spaces can be made to feel artistic and comfortable with the right design, or cramped and claustrophobic with the wrong design. Planning covers everything from where to put things to what dimensions each element needs to have to what (and how much) to accessorize with. You need to take your time to get these elements right because it can be very costly to try and fix them later.

Not enough storage – Storage can sometimes be the furthest thing from your mind when designing a bathroom you’ll love, but living in it from day to day will quickly become frustrating without enough storage. You need areas like drawers, vanities, hooks and cabinets to hide away items when you are not using them and keep the bathroom looking open, inviting and clutter-free. These things are especially true if more than one person will be using the space.

Not thinking ahead – Following stylish fads or trends may be fun in the moment, but it can lead to failure and financial tragedy if you follow them blindly. Many styles today simply look great, but have little or no function to them – rendering your bathroom more frustrating than anything else. Unlike painting the walls or changing the sheets when you decide the current style isn’t working, changing a bathroom’s design is very labor intensive and costly. The more practical route is to choose designs and styles that are classic or timeless, and to choose elements in the bathroom that are not just cutting edge – but actually improve the use of the room.

Hurting the planet – These days, most items that use resources are designed to conserve those resources. Still, make sure you are getting water saving faucets and dual flush toilets at the very least. Not only is “going green” the hot new trend, many of these energy and water saving elements are predicted to become necessity in the future as the resources become more expensive to use. Other options to look for are energy saving light bulbs and flooring or carpet made of recycled or renewable materials.

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Feng Shui For The Bathroom

January 30, 2012 in Bathroom Tips, Guides

The bathroom is very important in Feng Shui, and using its ideas and principles to design your bathroom can improve and enhance your life significantly. Many people who are interested in this ancient Chinese method seem to find the bathroom particularly difficult; how to decorate and furnish it, and its location in the home.

Of course, your bathroom is where you clean yourself, both on the outside and the inside, giving it a special importance in Feng-Shui. It is true to say that in your bathroom you experience a unique and perhaps special relationship with your body, making Feng Shui important and allowing you to feel relaxed and nourished.

In ancint China – just as now sometimes – many people found it difficult to really keep their bathroom clean, with the result that the bathroom was typically located outside the home. Today, it should be much easier to keep the all important bathroom clean, thanks to modern fixtures and more efficient plumbing techniques. Good Feng-Shui calls for a sense of relaxation and luxury in the bathroom, and today it is easier than ever before to make the room feel like an exclusive spa or retreat.

Good Feng Shui in the bathroom can be created by using the following three methods:

1. The bathroom is one place where your Chi energy should not be stuck, and it is important to keep this room neat, tidy and free of clutter. If you are like most people, your medicine cabinet and closet are full of all sorts of out of date products and stuff you no longer use, so your first step should be to clean them out and discard what you do not need. Make sure you use clean washcloths and towels, and have a supply of good quality linens for any visiting guests, and of course, your bathroom should be thoroughly cleaned regularly, at least once a week. Keep your bathroom uncluttered to improve the energy flow and promote harmony and well-being.

2. The water element in Feng Shui represents reflection, truth and spirituality and is the one most associated with the bathroom. However, it should also be balanced with the other four elements to create the best environment. The most powerful vertical drains in your home are in your bathroom, and the downward flow can be balanced with wood, the element representing growth and movement. Wooden accessories can be used, as well as perhaps a silk or live plant, or some green items. If you have artwork in your bathroom, choose that with a vertical theme, such as tress or tall buildings. Elements such as wet room shower screens also help, as they tend to be vertically orientated and run from ceiling to floor.

3. The next step is to focus on the area in which your bathroom is located, known as the Baqua area.

Ideally your bathroom should be situated in the part of your home known as the relationship area, and if this is the case, you may find that the quality of your relationships improves noticeably. On the other hand, you may want to decorate your bathroom with luxurious and stylish art evoking feelings of abundance and plenty, if your bathroom is situated in the wealth area. However, wealth can be easily flushed away, so do not forget to keep the lid of your toilet seat down when not in use.

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Make Sure Your Radiators Don’t Cost You This Winter

October 29, 2011 in Bathroom Radiators, Bathroom Tips

Radiators in homes up and down the country will be humming soon, as winter fast approaches. Make sure that your home is not a victim of unnecessary energy costs. Keep your bills down this winter and improve your standard of living by following these few tips:

Invest in New Radiators

One of the primary reasons for high energy expenses is the loss of heat by appliances. Your radiator, on the other hand, is designed to lose heat. However, if your radiator is old, perhaps even pre-dating your residence in your home, it may need to be replaced. Investing in a new radiator will be an added expense now, but it will save you money in the long term. New radiators can be purchased at a reasonable cost and installed with a minimum of fuss.

Insulate Your Hot Water Cylinder

A typical hot water cylinder loses an amount of heat per week capable of heating twenty baths. This is due to the poor insulation of the boiler. Have a look at your boiler: it if was installed in your house many years ago, it may need extra thermal protection. You can purchase a 3-inch jacket which fits around the cylinder, which will cut the weekly heat loss by as much as 70%. You can also save money by only switching on the heater an hour or so before the hot water is needed. Or perhaps try taking a cooler shower. Heated towel rails allow you to dry off with a nice hot towel, which can be just as refreshing as a hot shower.

Take a Shower

Filling the bath wastes six times as much water as taking a shower. If you have not installed a shower in your bathroom, it will be worth the savings in the long run to install one. Not only are showers more refreshing than a bath, they are more convenient and energy efficient, too. It is far more expensive to fill the bath than to take a shower as needed. Take a bath only every so often, when you want to relax, rather than every day. Many showers now on the market, including mixers and electric showers, can be installed in your home quickly.

These are just a few of the suggestions you might follow to increase your energy efficiency and assure your comfort this winter. Do consider making one-time investments in upgraded equipment, such as new radiators, in exchange for the savings and service they will bring you in the years to come.

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Fix your bathroom without breaking the bank

October 21, 2011 in Bathroom Tips

Bathrooms are one of the most important parts of our house. It is place where we can relax, bathe and relieve ourselves from the stress of a hectic days work. Nothing can be more annoying than a bathroom with leaking problems. Imagine longing for an hour in the bathtub, soaked in warm water while you are on your way from the office only to find that there is no hot water when you turn on the bathtub faucet.

When you have plumbing problems, no matter how minor you think it is, you should have it fixed immediately as a small plumbing leak can lead to serious concerns which will require extensive plumbing repair which is costly. In this difficult financial time, having your plumbing repaired by a professional can take a toll on your budget. However, there are many ways to save money on your plumbing repair.

As mentioned earlier, the more time you wait before you have your plumbing fixed, the severe your plumbing problems will be. Water from the leak can damage your walls and even your flooring. To save money, immediately have a leaking plumbing repaired regardless even if it is just a small leak.

When you are shopping for bathroom fixtures, you can find a lot of cheap bathroom suites at your local home depot. Although cheap, it does not necessarily mean that these bathroom suites are made of cheap materials. There are some that are made of the same materials used in expensive bathroom suites. Although it can be quite a challenge to find a good quality bathroom suite with an affordable price, there are some tools that can help you achieve just this.

To make it easier for you to find a good bathroom suite, you should ask a friend, a relative or a neighbor if they know a place where these affordable bathroom suites are sold. You can also use the internet to look for the best cheap bathroom suites.

Bathrooms are havens where the body can rest and relax in privacy and everyone deserves to have one free from plumbing problems such as leaks. You do not have to spend thousands of dollars to have a decent bathroom as there are cheap bathroom suites that would suit anyone’s taste.

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Tips for Choosing a Shower for Your Bathroom

June 24, 2011 in Bathroom Tips, Shower Trays, Showers

The shower in the average bathroom is often thought of as a convenient, alternative way to clean yourself over soaking in a tub of warm water. While it is easy to think of a quick shower as being all business and no pleasure, the modern day shower offers us a great deal of luxury.

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Choose Your Dream Bathroom Suite with Care

June 22, 2011 in Bathroom Suites, Bathroom Tips, Cheap Bathroom Suites

Today, it is not only the finest hotels in the world that can have the most modern and luxurious bathrooms. Home owners also can feel truly indulged by relaxing in their very own dream bathrooms as there are many very nice bathroom suites to choose from.

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