Our bathrooms need to feel both nurturing and joyful, energising us in the morning and helping us decompress in the evening. As the place you start and end each day, the bathroom is at least as important as any other room in your house. Yet too often, it can feel out of step with the rest of a home, invested with less love and personality. What’s more, the demands we put upon them, including water-friendly surfaces and bright, IP-rated lighting, can translate into a cold, unflattering atmosphere. Lighting, texture and colour are the key points to consider when designing a bathroom, and don’t forget to punctuate the space with something that piques your imagination and lifts your mood.
With bathroom lighting, careful planning is key. I always suggest having more than one circuit, fitting dimmers and using warm-white bulbs throughout. It is also fun to experiment with different heights of lighting: keep spotlights to a minimum and think about adding low-level fittings that wash the floor with light. ‘Mast Lights’, by Davey Lighting from Original BTC, fitted above skirting level will cast light downwards, instantly creating atmosphere. Hastings-based homeware store Dyke & Dean offers a great range of affordable bathroom lighting.
MAY WE SUGGEST: Design ideas for bathroom sinks and vanities
It is all too easy to end up with lots of hard, shiny surfaces. To avoid this, introduce a variety of textures. You can do this with a hand-finished bathroom tile that has an uneven glaze or shape, such as Emery & Cie’s ‘Zelliges’ range. Rather than tiling the floor, consider a waterproof, woven vinyl – I love the mustard colourway by The Unnatural Floor Company. Instead of painting the walls in flat emulsion, try using matchboard panelling or a patterned bathroom wallpaper, or an uneven limewash effect, such as ‘Fresco’ finish from Pure & Original. Where possible, I try to squeeze in some aged wood for texture – a wall-hung bathroom cabinet or a stool next to the bath, or the frame of a mirror or artwork. Adding fabric is another way to introduce texture: it also affects the acoustics, softening how sound bounces round the room, which makes the space feel cosier.
Colour is a powerful tool for injecting personality, and different colour combinations will create different moods. For a bathroom that you use every day, pink is hard to beat, because it is a nurturing colour that feels cosy at night and fresh in the morning. A soft pink combined with a muted green will have a calming effect. To create a more vibrant space, consider colour combinations that have a greater degree of contrast or slightly clash: think pink and mustard, or apple green and chocolate. In my own small shower room, I have ‘Eldblomman’ wallpaper by Josef Frank from Svenskt Tenn, bright yellow tiles, a ceiling in yellow gloss, and a red and white check curtain below the sink. In any other room it would be overwhelming, but in a small space, you can be a bit braver. For heating, consider having an electric mat under the flooring. These are straightforward for a builder to install and not wildly expensive. There is something very comforting about a warm bathroom floor underfoot. Don’t be tempted by expensive towel rails – they are rarely big enough. Instead, I prefer a chunky radiator with hooks above it; it will give off more heat and your towels dry faster if they aren’t folded up. Cologne & Cotton sells excellent towels, some with interesting detailing.
Any room will be endlessly frustrating if it is not user friendly and, in the case of a bathroom, that means provision for storage. This could be a vintage wall cabinet for medicines and sun creams, a chest of drawers for clean towels, or colourful baskets for corralling bath toys – such as those from The Basket Room, a female co-operative of African weavers. Tinsmiths in Ledbury is my first port of call for quality loo-roll holders, toilet brushes, hooks and ceramic shelves.
Lastly, think about how you can make your bathroom personal to you – perhaps with art, books or a riotous mix of family photos. In my own bathroom, I have a framed poem by an anonymous 17th-century nun. It’s about the art of ageing gracefully and was given to me by my parents when they moved house, so has a double meaning for me. Find something that makes you smile and points your mind in the direction you want it to travel.
