Thursday 25 October 2007

Goodbye grotty bathroom!


We have a grotty bathroom. It has a corner bath, which I can't stretch out in, and how I love to stretch out in the bath! It is a horrid beige and is a 'whirlpool', which, to be honest, I find just disturbs a peaceful bath and plays havoc with my bubble bath. I once forgot about the bubble effect and disappeared under a heap of foam! The novelty of that soon wore off.

Now it looks like this! Brian has spent the morning hauling out the offending corner bath, while a lovely roll top bath from the Bathstore sits promisingly on the path outside the back door, with a new loo, wash basin and ladder style radiator.

But we have just spent a good ten minutes with me sitting on the lid of the old loo and Brian standing in the middle of the bathroom gazing with amazement at the incredible creativity of previous plumbers. The cold water supply for the whole house comes in through the middle of the wall under the window, goes round the bathroom, stops off at the loo, then out through the wall to the washing machine, back on itself to the pump and then, presumably, upstairs to the tank. It comes from the Antarctic, filtering out the icebergs on the way, so is FREEZING. The warm, moist air of the bathroom hits it and the result is gallons of condensation. Added to this, the geniuses who built the 'wheelchair path' (complete with steps) around the house put it above the cold water pipe, which is a foot higher than the bathroom floor level, hence the damp.

So, as with all jobs, what seemed to be a simple task of taking out one bathroom and replacing it with a new one has turned into a marathon of digging up concrete, relocating pipes and making good. When we finally do get our new bath in, boy are we going to deserve it!

12 comments:

  1. Funny, isn't it, that the things that we uncover when renovating are never wonderful, sensible, well-thought-out high-quality things. They're always like your cold water supply - dubious quality, and obviously put in by someone who wasn't thinking ahead. You'll deserve that nice long soak in a new tub when you're done! Can we have some 'after' pictures?

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  2. Oh....been there , done that, too many times! It's going to look so much better, you will be thrilled with it.

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  3. Yep been there to, but it is worth it!

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  4. Had to laugh at this - we are in the middle of doing exactly the same thing! Maybe we're leading parallel lives. We've ripped out bath, basin and loo and are crammed into the (tiny) shower room - the new bath has just arrived - am hoping it doesn't take R too long to get it all done! Our friends who we stayed with this weekend couldn't believe that we didn't just 'get someone in' to do it all - I wish!

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  5. Wow I am going to enjoy following the transformation. We are hoping to get our 'grotty' bath replaced before Christmas with a power shower so will share photos with you then, probably we'll start just as you get to relax in your lovely new room!

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  6. You will definitely be ready for a good soak then! The during pictures always look scary don't they but I'm sure the end result will be worth it.

    Crystal xx

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  7. Oh best of luck - we went through all this last year and it was horrendous but well worth it in the end!

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  8. Oh well at least you have got started. I want a new bathroom but lack motivation to get the process started - partly because I can't have a stand alone bath with feet like I want. Bathroom too small. Pls put up pics when its all complete, and good luck.

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  9. Sounds like our house, no job is EVER simple, We put in a 'corner' actually it's an offset bath 5 years ago, but I don't like to stretch out so it's fine
    I'm sure it will be worth it eventually
    BTW we have 2 roll top baths round the farm as feed troughs - fashion is a strange thing

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  10. Jobs never turn out simple do they, you always end up fixing someone elses mistakes! We are going to do our kitchen next year. I wonder what joy that will bring!

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  11. Hi PM. I love these makeover blogs. They always spur me on ( though of course if I just got off here I would actually achieve something instead of merely thinking it!) xx

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