We bought our house in February 2021 and it was damn near perfect except for the bathrooms which could use a little extra love. They weren't a deal breaker for us, however because some of the other homes we toured made me actually cry as we walked out. You probably already knew this, but your dollar doesn't go very far when it comes to purchasing a home in California. The first home we toured had ceilings that were barely tall enough for my husband to stand in the room, yellow counter tops, plastic panels on the walls, and SHAG carpet.
We always said we would be willing to take on a "fixer upper." But some of these house's should have been a "tearer-downer" and "start from scratcher."
With all of that being said, we feel pretty lucky with the house we got. We've made small updates to light fixtures, and cabinet handles, etc. But renovating this bathroom will be the largest project we have taken on. I am SO excited. To start, here's a sneak peek of what the main hallway bathroom looks like now. It ain't pretty, but it works. Well, except for the shower. The shower is too small for us to get in. But would be great for kids! Thankfully, our other bathroom has a larger shower footprint, so that is where we get ready.
Above is what the bathroom looks like now. We haven't made an updates to it other than painting the floor grey. It was a speckled blue! I couldn't handle the color but it was the only thing I decided to invest time in. We also swapped the toilet paper holder and hung two hooks for towels.
This project will be the first renovation project either of us has ever started, but as all great renovation projects start with Pinterest, this one will be no exception. I've been pinning bathroom inspiration since before I even had a bathroom to remodel. I'll end up doing a final before and after post once we finish, but thought it would be fun to dig into the process of just getting started and what direction we're headed in.
The first thing I did was create a presentation in Canva. Canva is an amazing online creative tool to make presentations, social media graphics, email designs, business cards, and just about everything in between.
It allows me to upload screenshots and product info so I can create a mood board and share it with my husband or our sub-contractor. I created a page for each space in the bathroom and all the fixtures that we will need to make decisions on.
Vanity tiles
I added inspirational images and explained exactly what I liked about what was happening in the picture. It seemed like a better route than just a Pinterest board where I cant say exactly what I liked or didn't like and organize things accordingly.
I wanted the skinny tile look behind the vanity but also didn't mind larger tiles as long as they are going the long way vertically to make the ceilings feel taller.
I also loved the look of going half way up behind the vanity for a couple of reasons; it looks really nice, and it would cost less to tile only part of the wall. Look at me! Saving money!
Here are a couple of options I am toying with:
Our friends Work in Progress bathroom
Bathroom Mirrors
Our friends had renovated their bathroom recently, and I saw a behind the scenes where their medicine cabinet went into the wall. Well, now there's an idea! A medicine cabinet that doesn't stick out of the wall. Are you sensing the sarcasm? Both our current bathrooms have medicine cabinets that come out of the wall. Apparently that's not how they were intended to function according to my husband. I secretly love our medicine cabinet and the fact that I can open it day or night and have all of my hair and face stuff right there. Digging in cabinets and drawers is annoying. This was going to be the route we go for sure.
Hadley Gold Medicine Cabinet / Seamless Medicine Cabinet
I found a couple of medicine cabinets online that I liked and also started adding actual products to my Canva presentation. I uploaded the images, and then copied and pasted the links to the products, and to my surprise, the meta information including the price came right in with them instead of just the links. This is great for capturing images, price, and links so you can go straight to the source to buy when you make your decision.
The Vanity
There are limited options out there for mid century vanities. Everything looks so traditional. We know we have a few routes we can go at this point. The first is buying a vanity that comes 100% complete. I love the look of this Double Vanity from West Elm, but it's back ordered, and it's pretty expensive at $2,500. We know this will be the most expensive piece in the bathroom, but that's a hard pill to swallow right now, so we're going to keep searching.
The 2nd route we can go is to just buy the base vanity, with no top, and then source a top on our own that suits our needs. This would allow us to choose between one or two sinks, the style of the counter, whether or not it has holes for the faucets or if we would prefer them to come from the wall. It definitely allows the most customization, which makes me think we're headed in that direction.
Here are the three vanities I've got my eye on:
Vanity #1 // Vanity #2 // Vanity #3
The great thing about these topless vanities is that we can choose whatever we want for the tops. I love the look of a very light gray marble mixed with just about any wood color. It also helps hide the dirt more than a plain white bathroom counter would.
Fixtures
I thought I wanted to go with all brass, but the more I started looking for inspiration, the more I started to realize that everyone is combining black and brass and it looks SO good. It also stops everything from looking too matchy matchy. For now we're thinking brass mirrors and cabinet pulls, black faucets, and maybe a combination of a black and brass light sconce like the one shown below.
Here are the items that are in the running at the moment:
Black faucets
Brass shower system
Shower System #1 / Shower System #2
Brass drains
Drain #1 / Drain #2 / Drain #3 / Drain #4
Light Fixtures
Sebastian - Armed Sconce / Dion - Matte Black/Antique Gold / Pierre 1 Weathered Black/Autumn Gold Armed Sconce
Artwork
Depending on what amount of wall space we net out with and final accent colors, I am really liking the look of these abstract posters I found on The Poster Club and would love to use one or maybe two of them since you can choose the size you want on their site and I could do two smaller sizes.
Poster #1 / Poster #2 / Poster #3
Shower Tiles
If we're going with a light colored vanity tile, I want to go with something that has a little more life to it. Green is both my husband and I's favorite color so I knew I couldn't go wrong with proposing it for the shower. To me, it feels spa-like and very calming, exactly what we need when preparing for our crazy work filled days. We're definitely going to need to visit some tile stores around Los Angeles to see the colors in person, but I think we're leaning toward something on the lighter green side vs the hunter or forest green color. What do you guys think?
Via FireClay Tile (Rosemary Tile)
The final mood board looks a lil somethin' like this...
I could honestly go on and on about all the decisions that we need to make, but so excited about where we are right now. When we get the project underway, ill come back and get a progress post together, as well as a full before and after reveal. Stay tuned!
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