Embarking on a project of this size can seem like a daunting task. Renovating a large bathroom takes planning and patience. Luckily, a large space gives you a large canvas to discover just the right style for you and express yourself in a myriad of ways.

The bathroom is an important room in any house and you want to make sure it is both stylish and practical, a tough tight rope to walk. With a lot of space to play with, you have a real opportunity to create a welcoming place that is also functional and efficient. With this guide, we aim to give you all the inspiration you’ll need to utilise your space to its best.

With the correct preparation, anything is possible. Planning to renovate a room is no exception and when it comes to your bathroom, you want to make sure you get it right. Being a room in constant use, whether in a busy family home or just for yourself, there are several things you’ll need to think about before beginning.

It can be easy to get carried away with the exciting prospect of creating a new bathroom and forget some of the more functional design elements you need to include. Make sure to consider the amount of space between your bath or shower and your towel rail, you don’t want to be trailing a big puddle of water through the bathroom every time you have a shower!

With a larger space comes the temptation to spread all of your amenities apart, after all, you have the room, but it may be worth grouping certain elements together, such as basins and cupboards. This improves ease of use and gives you a larger amount of space to make your own and decorate with personal touches.

If you’re on a tight budget, think about using a porcelain or ceramic tile. This is because tiling the entirety of a large space will prove to be quite expensive. By being strategic with your tile placement and material, you will be able to create a professional look by tiling only essential areas such as above basins and behind showers.

If you are starting from scratch, begin by deciding where your toilet is going to be placed, usually, this will be as near as possible to the soil pipe. Installing a toilet will probably be one of the most labour-intensive parts of the renovation process and is costly to move if you decide after the fact that it isn’t where you want it to be.

Drawing a Plan

Bet you didn’t expect to be encouraged to do some arts and crafts in a style guide about bathrooms. It may seem silly or extraneous, but it can be a great aid to design by visualising where everything is going to fit in your bathroom.

You can do this simply by using grided graph paper and drawing a scale image of your bathroom, at 1:10 scale, a 2-metre wall would be 20cm long on the drawn plan, for instance. Then, create cut-outs of your shower, bath, toilet, cabinets and any other items you want to include and place them on the drawing to get a good sense of how the room will look once complete. This also allows you to see how much space will be taken up by essentials and how much you have to play with in terms of decorative features.

By using paper cut-outs, you can quickly see different layouts and get a true sense of what will work in the space and what won’t. Also, it’s quite a lot of fun.

If you do decide to create a plan in this fashion, remember to include windows and doors on the scale floorplan and any heating elements, such as radiators, since moving these will be expensive.

Top Tips 

• When planning, be sure to leave enough space around sanitaryware for access.
• The style of bath you want to use can often help determine the overall style of the room.
• Don’t be afraid to be creative. Once you have the essentials decided, you can experiment to find the right look. Combine different varieties of tile, wallpaper, and paint.
• Add LED strip lights around features, this effectively highlights the more interesting parts of the room.
• Check your floor joists if you decide to get a cast-iron or other heavy manufacturing material for your bath, the last thing you want is a bath falling through your floor!
• Personalise your space with art, photography, paintings, and sculptures.
• Large bathrooms are ideal for a separate bath and shower.
• Bring plants into the room to make it feel more inviting and vibrant.
• Use as much natural light as you can.

Renovating a bathroom should be an exciting process, but it can often feel formidable. If you’re a very experienced decorator, or it’s your first time tackling this sort of job, here are some interesting design ideas you may not be aware of to incorporate into your new bathroom.

Many of these ideas are general decorating and renovating advice, and the best way to utilise large spaces that won’t make them feel impersonal and empty. Use these tips as suggestions only, when it comes down to it, your personal style may not fit neatly into any one of the areas discussed below, and that’s okay.

Create a Focal Point:

Making a focal point in a large space can really help to tie the room together and give your bathroom the wow factor. A freestanding bath is ideal for this, as they are usually designed to be big and bold, with interesting colours and even sculpted detailing. For the ultimate luxury look, and if you can withstand the expense, a sculpture can prove to be an amazing focal point for a bathroom.

How to Use Colour:

Engaging in some mild colour theory for a second, light colours will make a space look larger, dark colours, smaller. Where the fun comes in, is in using both light and dark to highlight different areas of the room, enhance some and push others into the background. Often with a larger space, you can be bolder in your colour choice. By using shades of cream, for instance, for the bulk of the room and then using flourishes of a dark, bold colour you will really make those areas pop.

Storage Options:

With a large space available to you, you don’t necessarily need to be efficient with your storage. Although your instinct may be to choose space-saving storage solutions, the larger space is an opportunity to express your chosen design while utilising more interestingly designed sanitaryware. Consider a double basin, long shelves for towel storage and stand-alone bathroom storage cabinets to store away toiletries and other sundry items.

Lighting:

Something easy to overlook but essential for your bathroom is to utilise as much of the natural light as you can. This is because natural light brings a warmth and comfort to a space that artificial lights just can’t quite match. If you have limited light coming into your bathroom, use mirrors and light paint colours to enhance the available light.

For areas where natural light does not reach, use artificial lights strategically (such as LED strip lights) to even out the ambient light in the room and bring dull areas into the light.

Zones!

Partitions, bath screens, and half-walls are all effective ways to cordon off parts of a large space to create different zones. The advantage of this is to define separate spaces within the larger space for differing activities.

This way, there needn’t be a rush first thing in the morning when everyone is trying to get ready, giving everyone who uses the bathroom plenty of space and access to carry out their ablutions. It also helps to create a feeling of privacy in large family bathrooms.

Make your bathroom a wellness haven or an expression of efficient minimalism, and create a refuge for relaxation away from the world. The following style ideas are here to provide inspiration, hoping to fire your creative instincts and help you use your bathroom space to its optimum.  

Traditional:

This style emphasises the classic styles seen in the late 19th and early 20th centuries. If you have an older property then this may be the ideal choice, though thanks to advances in modern technology, a lot of aesthetically vintage sanitaryware and furniture is made to modern standards.

• Incorporate classical designs such as pedestal basins, claw-footed bathtubs, antique lighting and vintage-style toilets, taps and handles.
• Create a timeless look by using neutral colours with shades of cream, white, and soft pastels.
• Invoke elegance with traditional tile patterns, decorative mirror frames and moulded panelling.
• If cost allows, use a marble or granite material for countertops to add high-end quality to your bathroom.

Contemporary Minimalism:

If you have a large family and the bathroom is in constant use, this style will suit you best. By styling the room to emphasise clean, sleek and minimalist lines, it is easier to clean, will be more open plan and will have fewer decorative features and flourishes to get accidentally broken.

• Use large format tiles to create a sense of continuous space.
• Install modern sanitaryware such as floating toilets and wall-mounted cabinets.
• Air on the side of clean lines, sleek-looking furniture and frameless mirrors.
• Use a minimalist colour palette of only a few colours, use muted tones such as white, grey, and black.
• Choose fixtures with a matt or brushed finish.

Nature Inspired:

Take the outside and bring it in. It is well documented that being in nature provides a calming and therapeutic effect for people. To create the ultimate relaxation palace there’s no better inspiration than nature itself. Using as much natural material as you can and adding plant life will mean you’ll have to engage in more maintenance than with other styles. The effect of nature-themed rooms can be incredible, especially when blended with one of the other styles.

• Incorporate natural wood and exposed brick to create warmth. Use stone and other natural materials to bring an inviting atmosphere into the room
• Freestanding baths and stone sinks enhance the rustic vibe
• Choose a tile pattern that mimics nature
• Use art that emphasizes a naturalistic theme such as beach wood for a coastal theme, or plant life for a forest theme
• Use earthy colour tones to add to the natural ambience

Luxurious Spa:

This may be a bit more costly, but it can most definitely be worth it. Replicating a spa environment in your home is surprisingly easy, though perhaps not the most cost-effective. If you are willing and able, bringing a spa-like feel into your home makes the bathroom truly a place to enjoy spending time in.

• Go for a large walk-in shower with a rainfall shower head and heated floors
• Use pebble flooring in the shower and other natural materials like bamboo, granite, and marble
• Accessorise with plush towels, aromatic candles, and plants to create a serene atmosphere
• Bring in soothing colours like soft blues and greens, and calming earth-toned colours
• Consider mood and ambient lighting with warming light tones

Industrial:

This won’t be for everyone, but an industrial style is quite unique and a bold, creative choice. If you are inclined, you can lean towards either a steampunk or ultra-futuristic look with a few style tweaks to fixtures and fittings.

• Exposed pipes, concrete walls, and metal accents on cupboards and mirrors help give you a unique industrial feel.
• Matt black fixtures and shower heads will add to the overall look.
•  Use bold, contrasting colours and bright lighting.
• Choose vintage-styled taps and handles to lean into an industrial steampunk style.

The little things can make a big difference. Interesting finishing touches to your bathroom add a sense of character to the space, separating it from others with a similar style and making it feel like it’s a unique expression of yourself.

There are also things you can do to help modernise your bathroom, no matter what style you choose. Below, we’ll look at a few options for ways to incorporate technology in your bathroom that you may not be aware of.

Incorporating Smart Technology:

There are all sorts of incredible innovations that you can incorporate into your bathroom. Motion-activated lighting will ensure you don’t need to remember to turn the lights off once out of the room, and a heated toilet seat can add comfort on those cold winter nights. For the ultimate in control and luxury, you can install digital controls for your walk-in shower allowing you to customise the experience completely. You can even add in speakers and lighting to give you soothing music and chromatic therapy while you shower.

Eco-Friendly:

If you opt for a rustic style, then this is the next natural step. An effective way to be eco-friendly is to add plant life. Carefully consider the types of plants you want to have in the room, as the high heat and humidity can often be hostile for certain species of plant life.

There are specialised water-saving faucets and toilet fixtures you can obtain to help curb water usage. LED light fixtures are also more energy-efficient than other traditional types of lighting.

Personal Touches:

Art and bathroom accessories are a great way to bring your personality into the bathroom. Whether it be through sculpture, paintings or photographs, a well-placed image can help break up solid blocks of colour and be used as part of the design of the room. Think of the bathroom as an extension of the style of the rest of your house. Incorporating the same type of art throughout your home helps to build a cohesive vision of style together, no matter how the rooms are decorated.

There are so many styles to choose from that it would be impossible to discuss them all in this article. Hopefully, we have given you some inspiration to get started on your own renovation project.

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