Master Bathroom Design

Tony's House Projects

This page describes the design phase of the multi-year Master Bathroom Remodeling Project.
Ambitious Remodeling Ideas
I spent a fair bit of time working on designs that would reconfigure the shower and bathtub areas. I was trying to make the shower a bit larger by reclaiming some wasted space that existed between the current walls. The bigger shower meant moving the vanity area by the sink. I also got interested in making a roman tub with iridescent tiles. Below are some of the Blender renderings from early designs.
Aborted Design: New Vanity, New shower, Shortened Sink
Aborted Design: Shortened Sink and New Shower
Aborted Design: Vanity and Roman Tub
I never could settle on something where it all worked and would have been an improvement to the current layout, which was already quite good. This changed the scope of the project to only consider redoing the ceiling, walls and floors. I would not move any walls or fixtures.
Inspirational Photos
The trickest part was where to start. There are many material choices for the surface and many possible color combinations. A lot of web and image searches were done to generate ideas and I started zeroing in on the overall concept. Below of the images that most contributed to the final design.
Slatted Ceiling Inspiration
Curved Ceiling Inspiration
Kitchen Stone Wall Inspiration
Bathroom Stone Wall Inspiration
First Design
Settled on using wooden slats and an accent stone wall, the type of wood was the big choice to be made. I originally wanted something light to give it a clean look. I used the Blender software to build models and add textures to help visualize the designs and more easily play around with alternatives.
View from Sinks toward Entry Door.
View from Tub toward Sinks and Shelving.
View from Sinks toward Door.
View toward Shower and Toilet Area.
View of New Stone Accent Wall.
View of Sink and Doors to Outside.
Second Design
After thinking about what I did not like about the first design, I made some refinements:
  • The oak wood ceilings were just not the right color, a bit too yellow-ish, so I change to birch.
  • Added wood slats all around sink are (not just ceiling).
  • Got better texturing for dark blue slate tile floors.
  • Changed cabinet wood color to match birch ceiling slats.
  • Changed floor and door trim to match birch wood.
  • Remove the lights surrounding the mirror.
View from Sinks toward Entry Door (design 2).
View from Tub toward Sinks and Shelving (design 2).
View from Sinks toward Door (design 2).
View toward Shower and Toilet Area (design 2).
View of New Stone Accent Wall (design 2).
View of Sink and Doors to Outside (design 2).
The resulting changing looked much better and was at the point where I decided to begin the project. The rough plan was to start with the stone tile wall, then do the wood slat ceilings and lights, then the floor tile. Changing the cabinets in trim to match the birch wood will be last.
Design project like this can go on forever, but at a certain point, you have to commit and get going. I felt like I had arrived at that point. I knew the sequence I would do things in and figured I would keep thinking and adjust for the next phase as things progressed.
Third Design
Halfway through putting up the stone wall, and having done some more research into exactly what type of wood to use for the ceiling, I decided to change to use mahogany. Birch is too prone to rot and insects, and other light woods were not so great either. I thought about Bamboo, even (rounded) bamboo slats, but decided against that. I did not like the darker oak look, I think it was the yellow-ness of it and not the darkness per-se.
With the change to the ceiling color, I then suspected that the tile color needed to change too. I had also been debating whether to refinish the cabinets from their current white color to match whatever wood was used. It would look nicer, but would be a significant amount of extra work, especially since I would have to do it with the cabinets in place because I had no intention of taking out the cabinets. At this point I was trying to decide between these four choices:
Slate tiles and white cabinets.
Slate tiles and mahogany cabinets.
Sand-colored tiles and white cabinets.
Sand-colored tiles and mahogany cabinets.
Final Design
I very much wanted to have the wood slats of sink area be curved from the walls to the ceiling, but I had given up on this design early in the project. I did not have a good idea how to do it in a structurally sound way that would not be an incredble amount of extra work. Somewhere along the way I figured out a somewhat simple way to do it, and the curved ceiling made it into the final design. In the end, I also decided to not refinish the cabinets, mostly to save having to do even more work.
Final Design Rendering