Monthly Archives: February 2012
I need some inspiration (the prison bath makeover, part three)
I know regardless of the makeover, our bathroom will always be called the prison bath. But, under no circumstances will we be bringing back the penitentiary look. Bleh.
Even though, we have a lot more work to do before decorating, I like to get some ideas early for a game plan. Luckily, I can pin and bookmark to my heart’s content. Right now, my plan is a pretty neutral palette with pops of color in the accessories and artwork.
To come up with more details, I started a big internet research project this weekend. First up, was the lovely internet sensation, Pinterest. My searches for bathrooms, small bathrooms and even green, blue and purple bathrooms came up with some great stuff.
Then, I did a simple google search for “bathroom reveals” and “bathroom makeovers.” Although I found some cool shelter blogs, nothing really spoke to me so I switched gears again and started surfing all my favorite home stores.
I had already pinned a great medicine cabinet from Pottery Barn, but I also found this West Elm mirror that looks like a shark’s jawbone. I am kinda am in love with it. I wonder if I could try making one myself.
Nothing else jumped out at me, so I went to my favorite place for art – etsy as my final destination. My criteria was simple. Art with color and a subject that made me smile.
So, here’s three series I am really interested in:
1) suPmon’s Wes Anderson inspired prints
2) Sophie Blackall’s Missed Connection pieces
3) Rachel Austin’s Map Painting series
I feel all three have that right touch of whimsy, plus they would easily fit anywhere in my home. That’s important because I tend to mix it up often and I don’t want to buy something I could only use in one room.
Overall, I thought I did pretty well. The vision is getting a little clearer and more grounded. The bathroom in my head is now neutral with a decorative white framed mirror over the sink and whimsical illustrations on the wall.
Time will tell how much of this makes it into the final room, but it’s a good start. We will just have to wait and see where it goes from there.
All sources are available through my Bathroom Pinterest Board.
Sunday: Paint Day
After our exciting Saturday night demo session, I finally was able to start painting on Sunday.
After the toilet was removed, I could see the progression of colors the room was painted over the last 50 years. Looks like it started a light green, then moved to a bubble gum color before it became prison pink. All very lovely, but I think white is going to look a lot better than that motley crew.
With my devoted assistant by my side, I started to prime with my Kilz 2 Latex Primer.
We have used this throughout our home and I really like it’s coverage. Even with the Kilz though, the bathroom needed two coats of paint. That prison pink just held on and one coat just didn’t cut it.
Here it is after the second coat. Wow. The white is a breath of fresh air. Now I can focus on the design.
Next up, what are we going to do with the shower?
Jinxed it
I should have known better… titling our last post “three day” jinxed the bathroom makeover from a small update to a very large project. What started as painting weekend quickly deteriorated into major demo.
Here’s the scene Saturday night around 11pm.
Yep, not a stone unturned.
Here’s the rundown of what we did on Saturday.
TSP it then fill the cracks
The walls of the bathroom screamed for a good scrubbing. I mixed a big bucket of TSP and hot water then got to work getting the years of grime off the walls. Next, we filled all the holes, cracks and imperfections.
Sand it down
I noticed a lot of hair and other grime stuck in the paint when I was cleaning it. Besides being super gross, it left me with an uneven surface to paint over. I decided to give the walls a nice light sanding to remove as many of these textures as I could. Of course, I also sanded down all my filled holes too.
Remove the sink and toilet
As I cleaned and sanded, Nate took closer look at our sink and toilet. The sink needed a good cleaning and the faucet was going to be replaced, so we decided to get it out of the bathroom for a deep cleaning.
We knew the toilet was an issue. Decades old, it was a water hog and ran all the time. Not a good thing for our main bathroom.
Plus it was cracked on one side.
We ran over to Home Depot to get a proper sewer stopper before we removed it. (We also got some delicious Korean food at a local Karaoke place called Blue Moon Cafe.)
Removing it was relatively painless, but when we set it down outside it somehow chipped a big piece off and well, that was the end of the toilet.
Now that the sink and toilet were gone, we could finally see how bad the linoleum flooring was. So out it went and we were left with this empty pink room.
Next up, I finally get to paint…
Tackling the prison bath in three days
Last night Nate started prepping the Prison Bath for a much-needed paint job. We both wanted a simple home project to tackle over our three-day weekend.
We’ve been spending a lot of time figuring out what to do with our roof lately. It’s an overwhelming project that looks to be mighty expensive. After receiving our first quote on the work, we may need to push of the project for a year or two. It’s so expensive and we still are paying off our windows and doors. Of course, pushing off the inevitable could cause us more problems down the road, but I think sometimes you got to go with your gut. (My gut is saying live within your means and chance it.)
So in the meantime, giving our guest bathroom a makeover sounded like a great diversion.
I wrote a whole post on our Prison Bath last year. See it in its full glory here but basically its a pink embarrassment. (We had hoped Bath Crashers would choose it to renovate, but they decided against it.)
So, back to last night… Nate started prepping for the painting today. He took all the fixtures, guard rails and towel racks down and made one big discovery.
A hole for the original medicine cabinet through the concrete wall. It was a total surprise and still unsure what we are going to do with it. It’s almost too small to use, but I love the idea of a recessed cabinet like this one from Pottery Barn. Guess we will have to put some more thought into it.
Today we’ll clean and then prime the walls. I can’t wait to see the bathroom in a nice coat of white paint. I won’t let Nate even start to think about paint color until we get rid of the pink haze.
