Making a Small Bathroom into an Elegant Space
Now I won’t lie to you darlings, there are many aspects of updating our home that excited me far more than the prospect of updating our bathroom – I mean, how much could you really change a room that has very practical requirements, and well, has the purpose of cleaning one’s self? Oh! How wrong I was. Head over to the @OldHouseOurHome instagram to see how the room looked before, but now let’s dig into the details of what makes this bathroom such a beautiful space.
We started with the ‘bathroom furniture’ as I like to call it. Hoping to find some practical pieces that were modern in their functionality and yet classic and timeless in their style. We fell upon the Tavistock Bathroom collections, and instantly knew it was perfect for what we wanted; the Vitoria sink unit was our starting point, with a timeless look to it – a ceramic basin and elegant unit which we chose in a Pebble Grey shade. Once we had this starting point, it was about finding pieces to match in well with this style, and we continued the hue of the Pebble Grey across the WC, and colour palette for the walls. Sticking with Tavistock, we wanted a shower unit with a rain style head as well as a hand held – giving the bathroom a traditional finish and look of a bygone era, and yet it fits seamlessly with this newly finished yet classic space.
A slipper style bath tub with Victorian style legs was the obvious choice given it’s the first thing you see upon entering the bathroom space, it’s a smaller size which is perfect for our family – we are all quite petite, and the space doesn’t feel too cramped with the tub in the room!



Styling the Space
Now with a somewhat small space, it can be easily cluttered, so we stuck to a bright and fresh colour scheme throughout the bathroom, with the tread of the grey/green tone running throughout. The Pebble Grey of the Tavistock units was our starting point, and then we sifted through hundreds of paint colours until deciding on Crown Paint’s Tuscan Olive as the perfect accentuating tone. To bring back the classical period styling that runs throughout the rest of the property, into a room which can look quite stark, we chose to add half height panelling to the walls. At just over an inch thick, it doesn’t take up much space at all, but enables us to have a shelf for pretty cosmetics and candles alike, but most importantly adds character to the space.
As a side note; if you opt for a sink which is wall mounted such as the ‘Micra’ sink from Tavistock, wall panelling is a great way of hiding unsightly pipes.
For the floor, practicality was our number one priority; easy to clean and yet beautiful too. We chose ‘Limestone Cool’ from Amtico flooring for the space, despite the name of the tiles, we feel they actually have a warm glow to them, and once again they pair beautifully with the grey green palette. They were incredibly easy to fit too; as they’re so slim, we were able to lay them on top of the old bathroom tiles – saving us a lot of money in installation costs!
Avoiding too much clutter is key to a relaxing and elegant space, so the sink unit with it’s spacious cabinets within was an excellent decision in this bathroom. Carefully chosen products line glass shelves, and yes, we chose products with a neutral light colour to them so they don’t create too much of a ‘statement’ against the white walls.
The bathroom transformation took about one month in total, while the builders worked on other jobs simultaneously, and we couldn’t be more thrilled with the final space!
Thank you to our contributors, Tavistock Bathrooms, Crown Paints and Amtico Flooring
xoxo