Before & After: A Little Black & White Bathroom Gets an Update

Catherine
by Catherine
9 Materials
We finally finished our historic townhome renovation! (If you follow us on Instagram, you probably knew that already, but stick with us ok?) One of our favorite makeovers in the house was the bathroom. Not only was it small and awkward (the whole thing is only 6x6), but it was also the only one in the house. A few of its many quirks included oversized sconces that prevented the door from fully opening, a toilet that almost touched the tub, and a tub that took up half the room. Also, it felt old. Not the cute, vintagey kind of old, but the grimey kind of old.
We didn’t intend to fully gut the bathroom because we wanted to keep costs down, but quickly discovered we would need to when we found some nasty water damage on the floor under the tub.
So, we started from scratch and took everything out, including the rotten subfloor. We opted to keep the original mini-clawfoot tub, but moved it to the back wall and added in-wall plumbing. We repainted the outside of the tub in Farrow & Ball Downpipe, and revived the feet with brass spray paint. We tiled all of the bathroom walls with floor to ceiling subway tile and dark grout. We replaced the old cracked pedestal sink with a new one, and swapped the two oversized sconces with one overhead pendant to save space. For the floor, we opted for an updated take on the old black & white tiles with a patterned tile from Home Depot.
We purchased our fixtures from Amazon (hint: ordering the trim kit and valve separately saved us lots of moola!) We found the round mirror at Target and the pendant at Restoration Hardware Outlet for $30. The turkish towels are also from Amazon.
By DIYing the bulk of the work and being smart shoppers, we kept the cost under $3k. For source information & direct links to the products we used, head over to the blog! In the meantime, be sure to follow us on Instagram @beginninginthemiddle.
Catherine
Want more details about this and other DIY projects? Check out my blog post!
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  • Vicki Vicki on Jan 13, 2019

    What did you do with toilet ?

  • Judy Cunningham Burnett Judy Cunningham Burnett on Jan 13, 2019

    I’d like to know what size that Claw Foot Bathtub cost you too. I would love go back to a small tub and get rid of my shower.

  • Maya Ruiz Maya Ruiz on Apr 11, 2019

    How did you get the shower curtain rod to hang like that?

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