The wife and I have spent the last couple of months remodeling our master bathroom. Well, not us personally, but the people we hired. Our house was built in 1994, and the master bath was mostly original with ugly brass fixtures, 4" white tile, and a giant jacuzzi tub that we never used. At some point one of the previous homeowners had undertaken a minor reno, and replaced the floor tile, tiled the vanity countertop, and painted the walls and vanity. Unfortunately, they did it very cheaply -- the floor tile was nice, but the install job was terrible with uneven tiles, cracking/sandy grout, and loose tiles in spots. The vanity counter top was even worse (who wants a tile countertop anyway?) with uneven cuts, sharp/unfinished edges, and a couple of the tiles had actually fallen off. The paint was poorly done, with the equivalent of overspray where they'd accidentally painted the ceiling/door jambs/etc. All of the brass fixtures were started to get that worn/green scum look to them. So the wife and I were just tired of it. Here's the before shots:









We forgot to take a complete set of pictures before we started demo, so it's kind of hard to get a feel for the layout. These are from when we first moved in two years ago, but not much had changed between now and when we started this project.

 

I'm reasonably handy, but there was no way I wanted to take on a project of this magnitude myself. We wanted to expand the shower (which would involve moving two walls and a bunch of plumbing and electrical) and replace basically every inch of the bathroom. So we hired one of those kitchen and bath places (in this case, Imagine Kitchen and Bath) to do the design, provide the materials, and hire the contractors. We started this process in February and got quotes and designs from 3 different design places. All of them were very similar in pricing, but one woman impressed us very much with the thought she put into her design and the fact that she had picked out a ton of materials and color swatches for us at our very first meeting. By the time we'd picked out all of our materials, met with the contractors, got everything ordered, etc., we didn't start demo until the week of June 11th. Here's some demo shots:


From Entry


Old shower


Old Vanity


Old Tub

 

my master need a major overhaul too, but i'm painting the house right now and that cost a grip Can't wait for the after pics

 

We approximately doubled the shower space, and replaced the oversized jacuzzi tub and deck that we have used once since we moved in with a much smaller standalone tub. The vanity stayed approximately the same size, but got some upper cabinets, swanky soft-close doors, and a bunch more drawers.


Bunch of new electrical by the vanity -- went from 2 outlets to 4 outlets. 3 of those outlets will be hidden in the upper cabinets.


New shower framing/pan.


Re-working of the toilet room.






New tub layout with triangular ledge for faucet.



In progress shower tiling.








Big corner nook in the shower for all of our shampoo etc. Ledge/bench for the wife to put her leg while she's shaving.
The shower tile is a really cool tile with a fabric-like texture. The accent is a combo of several different marbles and glass tiles.

 

getting ready to tile my master bath

 

We're a fan of the brick-style/offset tiling patterns.


This doorway used to be an arch, but we had them square it off. We eventually want to put in a sliding barn door here. Were originally going to do it in this reno, but it was an easy line item to take out once the costs started to climb...


Took over one of our spare bedrooms as a prep/storage area.








Close-up of the granite we used. I like to call this "Racist granite." The slab we bought was labelled as Super White, but it's also called White Fantasy and White Supreme depending on what yard you get it from. ::reechy:
We really love the look of Marble, but there were just too many horror stories about how soft it was and how easy it is to scratch/stain/discolor in a bathroom setting. So we found this granite (actually a "dolomitic stone," not quite granite but typically labelled as a granite at stone yards) which has a very similar look to marble but without all the downsides. Kind of pricey, though.

 

Now for all the final shots.






My wife bought these candles. I thought it was silly at first, but now I think they look fantastic in this corner.













So there you have it! We're very happy with the quality of the work done by the contractors, and there thankfully weren't really any unexpected costs or anything. But I love every part of it. The shower is gigantic and finally big enough for two. There's a ton of storage in the vanity. All of the tile, granite, fixtures, etc. feel solid and very high end. /sappy/ It's now our very own spa-like retreat. /sappy/

Our only complaint was the time it took. Our contract called for the work to be completed in 18 business days, but by the time all was said and done we didn't get the master bath back until 37 business days had passed. Thankfully we don't have any kids atm, as we were just able to move into the guest bedroom and guest bath for the 2 months it took. Additionally, if we were to do something like this again we'd probably hire a designer and a general contractor, but not go through one of those all-in-one places. The problem was that all the materials had to be purchased through them, which meant we paid MSRP for every single thing. They did guarantee everything, delivered everything, and if there was any problem with measurements/quantities or whatever they took care of it without any additional cost to us. But we could of saved a ton if we'd been able to buy tiles or fixtures or whatever on Amazon instead of at MSRP.

 

fantastic, musta cost a grip.

 

Might as well post these pics too. Halfway through the bathroom reno we decided to do a minor makeover of the Master Bedroom as well. Basically new paint, new ceiling fan, new lamp, new outlet covers, new chair, that sort of thing. Didn't change any of our furniture or bedding or anything like that.

Before shots:




The wall color (there when we moved in) is a little darker in person than in these photos. I non-affectionately called it baby-poop brown.


As mentioned, we moved out of here during the bathroom reno so the place was a wreck.


Me installing new ceiling fan. Not as hard as I expected. And now we have a remote control!


New chair from American Furniture Warehouse. It's rare that the wife and I find furniture that we like and fits our needs that is also very inexpensive. But this was one of those rare circumstances.




Also picked up a new soundbar for the TV. Not because we needed more oomph from the speakers (though that was a bonus), but because this damn TV doesn't get very quiet. Even at the lowest volume setting it's still relatively loud, which is a problem because the wife falls asleep before I do and I like to have the TV on for a bit longer, meaning she occasionally wakes up to complain that it's too loud. Thankfully I found the soundbar on clearance at Target, and now I've turned off the TV speakers and routed all sound through the soundbar. It gets beautifully quiet.

 

There's always something with a house; it's really quite amazing how many things need to get done. We also need new windows, a new deck, would like to update the guest bath, and probably need to repaint all of the exterior trim. But you've got to prioritize your budget.

Yes, unfortunately. We originally wanted to do this about a year ago, but then we did some preliminary looking at how much it would cost and found out it was approximately twice what we had thought it would be. So we held off for a while and built up our finances. We're in the process of refinancing our house and actually have an appraisal scheduled for tomorrow, so hopefully all we invested will be reflected in our new house value.