Out, Out, Damned Tile!

For our twenty-fifth wedding anniversary last October, Andy's parents told us they were getting us a new bathroom! As in, to replace the unbelievably decrepit and depressing master bathroom that we have been using for the last 13 years. (I've half-joked that I think my mother-in-law just could no longer stand to use our bathroom when she's over.)

Our house was built in the 1920s, and we are only the third family to live here. The first family was the architect who built the house. Because he was both designing it and planning to live in it, it's built like a fortress and has lovely architectual details throughout. The second family moved in around the 1970s or so. Unfortunately, the few changes they made to the house were mostly horrible, at least one of which was replacing whatever original sink was in our bathroom with a tacky vanity.

It took us months to pick out our fixtures and tile (why, I can't say, since we ended up with plain white for almost everything, and the bathroom is TINY, so there's not much to even think about), and work finally began yesterday. We will be without our bathroom for about 2 months! We have other bathrooms, but it's still an inconvenience, especially in the middle of the night. Plus the guys start very early in the morning. And make a ton of noise. And raise a ton of dust. (But they are nice.) This morning they were jack-hammering the floor, so I decided to take off work and go to Costco. (Yes, you know it's bad when an extended visit to Costco is more relaxing than being in my home office!)

Here are a few "before" shots to give you an idea of how excited I am to have a new bathroom in my future.

We were told that the tiles on the floor and walls were very high-end and expensive in their day, but they sure look ugly now.

See that pretty wallpaper, though? We put that up; that's the only thing we changed. When we moved in, we had to choose 14 different wallpapers! The walls in this house are so old and covered with so many layers of old wallpaper that it was prohibitive to even consider painting instead. Besides, I love really gorgeous wallpaper! (Someday I will remember to show you some of the other lovely papers I chose for the rest of the house.) I almost had a breakdown at the wallpaper shop, so the wallpaper lady closed the shop and drove with me to the house. She went room to room with me, and every time I started to say something, she'd shush me. We drove back to the shop in silence, and then she started pulling books off the shelves and opening them up to certain pages. I went with nearly every one of her choices. (That's why she's the wallpaper lady!) Anyhow, she took one look at this bathroom and said, "There is only one paper that can save this bathroom." And she was right. I recall that it was very pricey, but we needed only one roll because the bathroom is so small and has 2 windows and a door, plus the paper starts at shoulder height.

Yes, that's a tankless toilet. Sigh.

The old tub had been jimmied to accomodate a shower and curtain. It is the bane of my existence. The curtain liner has to go all the way around because there's paper on the walls, so you end up standing in the shower with the soap-scummy plastic lapping at your legs from every angle, and I nearly cry every day when I take a shower. Plus, we had developed a bit of a mold problem on the ceiling, since we had no exhaust fan and the windows stay closed for quite a few months out of every year.

 

 

Here's the aforementioned ugly vanity and the oversize radiator:

And here's how it looks today, just a day and a half after they started working:

Yee-ha!

Comments

[amy]

karen,

coincidentally, we are doing the EXACT SAME THING in the boys' bathroom. They had a bathroom between their rooms only accessible from their rooms, and in addition to being the only used bathroom of two teen boys--it also had very little venting so there was MOLD and STENCH everywhere. SOOOO gross. So now it is all gutted and the workmen come at 7:45am and they are loud and there is plaster dust everywhere and each morning around 9am they come down and say "Well, we have another little problem". Old houses are beautiful to live in but suck for renovating. What, the joists have all been cut into? What, there are random wires that are in the floor that now have to be capped? Hello another hole in the kitchen ceiling. I go to Home Goods to get away from it and look for mirrors and shelving to put up when they're through. Which they said would be 6 weeks so I'm prepared for 3 months. Will be great when it's done though! And they boys (who are at college) will be so appreciative...umm, NOT.

[Karen]

Oy! Our girls have that kind of bathroom, so when I need to pee in the middle of the night, I either have to barge in on one of them sleeping or go up to the third floor to Pete's attic lair or go down to the mudroom. (Yes, I know we are lucky to have multiple bathrooms at all. Still. I'm old and don't do change well.) Good luck on your project!

[Elena]

Can't wait to see the "after" pictures!

[Stephanie]

After living through our renovation, I can tell you it was WORTH IT. And we did okay, minus a kitchen and bathroom. LOL. But it was worth it. Can't wait to see the finished photo.

[Steve]

Isn't that where Cliff and I got dressed for our wedding?

[Karen]

Yes! Well, you got dressed in the bedroom, but I'm sure you used that god-awful bathroom—and were gracious enough not to say a word about it! :)