Remodeling A Bathroom

Sometimes you’ll encounter a bathroom on vacation that’s really inspiring and unique. Raffi shares some tips on how he re-created the theme of an early 1800s English cottage after being inspired on his overseas travels. It took some work and some cash, but in the end, the perfect results!

For my bathroom remodeling/redecoration I chose the theme of an English cottage in the early 1800’s – inspired by a bathroom I had stayed at when traveling in Scotland. I already had some antique furniture and decorative items up in my attic, but I wanted to coordinate the fixtures and tile-work to the theme as well. My bathroom has an antique claw-foot tub, but I was unhappy with the modern fixtures and handles that somebody had put on before me. I was thrilled to find that a simple Google search could reveal several online retailers that could supply me with either genuine restored antique faucets or very well done reproduction pieces. I chose the latter and within 2 weeks, I received some elegant new faucets for my tub. I have never been happy with the sink vanity that was in this bathroom – a bulky vanity in a sickly green porcelain color. I chose to simplify for elegance and to bring a bit of sophisticated country charm to the bathroom. We took out the vanity (yes!) and replaced it with an antique maple dry-sink that was in the attic. I ordered a porcelain basin that sits like a big bowl (an “overmount”) on top of the dry sink and connects to the plumbing; it looks very vintage and “shabby chic.” Instead of painting the walls, I decided to wall-paper, which in retrospect was a silly thing to do, because the room has dormer windows which are difficult to move around. I chose a beautiful toile print in a robin’s egg blue color, which I ordered from Pierre Deux, an online store that specializes in toile print wallpaper. It wasn’t cheap, and it took a lot of elbow grease, but it looks stunning. I had the linoleum tiles replaced with simple 2×2 tiles in black and white, creating a strong and interesting geometric contrast with the whimsy of the wallpaper. Finally, I had several photographs of architecture in the English city of Warwick a photographer friend took for me framed in black walnut frames to complement the theme and color arrangement. In total, I spent about $5750 dollars – the most expense going to the vanity and tiling.

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