The bathroom

This bathroom remodel has been a complete bear. Now, please understand, we have only one bathroom, so this took a lot of planning. We waited until spring and the warmer weather. We have an outdoor shower and hot tub, which has made cleaning up not so bad. Where the danger really came, was the two days we have been without toilet facilities. Believe me, the practice of "bucket and chuck it" ain't much fun!

The demo was a complete "roaring whore" as my contractor Andy calls it. This house was built in 1957 and the bathroom was designed to withstand a nuclear winter, I have decided. It was your basic 1950s black and white tile bath. Here are the pics of the before.




The large hole over the sink was where I pulled out the old medicine cabinet three or four years ago. I had been meaning to tile it and fix it and stuff, but never seemed to get around to it. So, I just propped the old mirror in the hole and live with it. We had replaced an old rotting vanity with a new, low end, big box store, expresso cabinet and a medicine cabinet over the toilet. I had painted this tiny little room about four or five times, and unhappy each and every time. It was more than ready for a real update.

Now, the demo was to pull out all the old tile on the walls down to the studs. What we didn't know to begin with is that the tile was hiding damn near three inches of 50 year old concrete. Concrete continues to cure its entire lifetime, simply getting harder and harder over time... Behind this wall of concrete is razor sharp steel mesh nailed into dimensional studs. This was a near crippling experience. It took us almost two weeks to complete the entire demolition. Hammers, sledges, and even a hammer drill were put to use on this thing. We hauled out three or four truckloads of demo waste.







The first thing Andy did was retile the tub surround and replace the old crappy fixtures with new ones.




Yesterday she laid the new floor over the old floor, after leveling everything.


Today, she grouted the floor, installed most of the beadboard, and most importantly, she installed my brand new toilet that is supposed to be able to flush a whole meatloaf!! I am a happy girl.


Tomorrow, Andy will do some electrical work, finish the beadboard, install the cap, install the square pedestal sink and fixtures, fix the hole, move the light fixture up, install a mirror and shelf, and leave me ready for painting. Next week, I have another contractor coming in to reglaze the tub. Once that is fully cured, we will install frameless shower doors. Then I can paint, and it will be ALL finished....whew! I will post more pics as I get them. The beadboard, doors, and trim will be white. I think we're going to go with a more robin's egg blue for the walls, and a white ceiling.