Bathroom reno floor plan advice

Discussion in 'Renovation & Home Improvement' started by martini, 22nd Sep, 2019.

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  1. martini

    martini Well-Known Member

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    Hi again
    I'm looking for constructive feedback on floorplan for a bathroom reno in a bne postwar. General advice seems to be to retain a bathtub as it's a family area (3 bed house), however, I'm finding it tricky to fit everything in.

    The room is 2700mm long, with entry door on LHS of a short end, and a window approx 500-700mm wide on the opposite short end wall, directly in corner opposite door.
    The room is 1800mm wide.

    I've attached a photo of the current bathroom and two options I've mocked up in Reece planner.
    Layout 1 moves bath to under window, but I think it's awkward with shower placement.
    Layout 2 removes bath, has a shower on wall beside window and would have a single glass pane running out of wall between window and shower rose. Seems like lots of wasted space.

    I don't want to do a shower over bath.
    I've tried to find small baths but they all seem pretty big!
    I HATE standard size showers (e.g. 900x900 or 1000x1000) - I feel very claustrophobic.

    It seems like a fairly standard bathroom size but I just can't make it work. Any tips?

    (toilet is in a separate room).

    TIA Bathroom Photo.jpg Layout 1 end.PNG Layout 1.PNG Layout 2 end.PNG Layout 2.PNG
     
  2. wylie

    wylie Moderator Staff Member

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    Your plan with the bath works ok but you will need to choose a narrower vanity and keep your shower to 900 wide and 1200 long.

    We have a similar layout but our bathroom is 2.1m x 3m and it works for us and we have a toilet between shower and bath. We chose a sliding class door to avoid a hinged door in a smallish room. You need 1200 for a sliding door.

    Our storage is pushed into an adjacent room (including dirty clothes basket) and we have a narrower than usual wall hung basin with bottle trap and mirror cabinet with shelf pushed into the wall cavity and in-wall cistern.

    With these slight tweaks it doesn’t feel small. I found these photos that don’t show the shower but it is 1200 x 950 and is a good size and the glass door you can see to the left is an ikea two door tall cabinet that holds sheets, towels, loo rolls, rubbish bin, laundry hamper.
     

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  3. martini

    martini Well-Known Member

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    Thank you Wylie. The photos are lovely. Do you have trouble cleaning behind the bath? And does your shower have screen all the way around it - which side has the sliding panel?

    Do freestanding baths take up less space than built ins?
     
  4. wylie

    wylie Moderator Staff Member

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    I rarely clean behind the bath. I just peeked behind it and there is a little dust, but not a lot. I guess it just doesn't really get dirty as it is behind a big bath?

    Here is a photo taken from the window. The shower is 95cm wide to allow us a towel hook so we step out and the towel is waiting. Our towel rails are near the window so without this hook we would have a very wet floor as we reach for the towel.

    If you don't want that, and you have the wall opposite the shower to take a towel rail, you could have a wider cubicle right up to the door itself.

    The 1200 long side takes the sliding door and from memory, it does need to be 1200+ to allow room to enter. We have three family members over 6' and this shower is not cramped, unlike the 900 x 900 we used to have downstairs which I found very cramped (and I'm 5'2").

    We chose cavity slider many years ago. In our bathrooms designed for our townhouses, the designer has specified a shelf along the length of the shower which I think is much better than the niche we have. But with a narrow room you won't want to build out the lower part of the wall to get a shelf, so a pushed in niche leaves you more width at floor level.

    A full length shelf will be easier to clean and easier to fit more things on. We chose a niche as we could push it into the wall cavity on the wall the shower fitting is, to keep it as dry as possible. We could have had a wider niche on the longer wall.

    We pushed the toilet cistern, the mirror shaving cabinet and the niche into the walls to give us more space.
     

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  5. wylie

    wylie Moderator Staff Member

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    I don't think they take up more space, but our bath is fairly wide, but not terribly long. We could have chosen a narrower bath.

    More importantly, there is more work with installing a bath into a hob, and it is rather dated these days I think. Every bathroom fashion comes and goes, and we had drawn drop in baths in our townhouse plans, but have switched to freestanding for a more contemporary look.
     
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  6. craigc

    craigc Well-Known Member

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    4AF9CEB8-7CF6-4FF9-A728-597D66835E49.jpeg There are a number of small freestanding baths you could look at (I’ve seen online down to 1400 but probably smaller available).
    But how about a simple glass screen (say approx 1000mmm) and walk in shower in front of the bath? I saw this setup in a display home a few years ago and seemed to work ok.
    Ie like this (excuse rough work on phone).
    Requires glass screen only between vanity & shower, remains open between shower & bath (so would feel larger). Glass allows light to flow through room.
    Vanity sits between door & glass of shower. No shower door or hinges required. Towel rails, hooks on wall where vanity currently sits.
    Good luck
     
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  7. housechopper2

    housechopper2 Well-Known Member

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    Modify layout 2 by switching the wall the vanity is on. Then have the single pane of glass separating the vanity from shower rose. No wasted space, no bath.
     
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  8. Westminster

    Westminster Tigress at Tiger Developments Business Member

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    This bathroom is 1700m wide but longer than yours - however we have a double vanity and toilet in it which you don't need. You could put the bath under the window (around 800mm wide) then shower area next to it (allow 900mm) then you have enough room for a 1000mm vanity

    Due to the constraints of the narrow room we went with the wet room concept where the shower is in front of the bath and is open to each other. THis really freed up space and allowed a large shower as it wasn't enclosed except for one side. There is a channel grate/drain running along the floor on the shower side of the glass

    The freestanding bath is a Clark 1400mm (or was it the 1500mm) model

    Here is some photos

    [​IMG]

    [​IMG]
     
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  9. Westminster

    Westminster Tigress at Tiger Developments Business Member

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    Just realised this is what I posted. Good suggestion @craigc
     
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  10. martini

    martini Well-Known Member

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    That’s great thanks everyone. I’ll ask the plumber to price it up.

    In terms of the 1800 width, what length should be shower screen and what length opening (to walk through)?

    Anyone with recs for someone to do the works in BNE 4170? I’ve got a guy quoting that by agent uses for repairs. He seems good but I should get another quote.
     
  11. Westminster

    Westminster Tigress at Tiger Developments Business Member

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    I would do the glass panel around 950mm which gives a little more coverage than a standard 900mm screen but still allows 850mm to walk through to get to the bath
     
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  12. korando1234

    korando1234 Well-Known Member

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    If you're really tight on space, I'd go "shower over bath" instead of two separate. The advantage of that is more room around the bath which could be desirable for parents needing to bath babies/toddlers
     

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