Budget Bathroom

A case study of the refit of the bathroom in my own house to see how we made the most of this space with just a few simple tricks.

The existing bathroom was pretty uninspired:

It all starts with an idea. This idea should run through the entire project, and relate everything back to it. In this case this simple bathmat from Ikea led to the idea of a seaglass mosaic bath panel.

This seaglass theme will be the core idea behind the project. The first step was to repaint the bathroom in a teal colour which would complement the bath panel using damp resistant paint.

We stripped the existing lino, removing any excess glue and carefully planned new cork tiles to act as the “sand” for our beach theme by laying them out, marking any squint edges, or cuts for bathroom fittings and carefully cut in place. The tiles were then fixed using spray adhesive. Our floorboards were level and in good condition but for uneven floors we would recommend laying 9mm plyboard first. The finished tiles were then given 2 coats of clear polyurethane varnish for extra protection from moisture.

We replaced the cheap chrome taps with nicer antique brass taps second hand from Gumtree, redoing silicone where necessary to taps, bath and shower screen.

For the panel itself we removed the existing panel, and cut a sheet of 9mm OSB to fit the bath.

The seaglass was patiently gathered from the beach beside out studio in Gourock during the dog’s walk

The OSB panel was then grouted, and seaglass painstakingly placed into the mosaic over many long nights!

This panel was then carefully predrilled and fixed into its new home on the bath.

We used leftover seaglass from the bath mosaic, with copper wire to create a bespoke lampshade.

We then repainted the tiles with tilepaint to match a second colour from the mosaic, and relined the grout lines with a grout pen.

All the little extras can make a lot of difference: we repainted the sink and bath drains and handles to match the taps in Hammerite gold waterproof paint and furnished the bathroom with lots of timber, wicker and teal accessories.

We also replaced the existing toilet roll and towel holders with simple copper pipe fittings which we made ourselves to contrast against the teal of the sea glass nicely. This kind of attention to detail can really make a project shine!

This budget bathroom renovation is an example of how you can refit your existing bathroom on a tight budget. The entire project including materials, fittings and small bits and pieces came to approximately £300.

Before

After