What to do with an L-shaped bathroom

Gazelle1985

Weve recently bought a house with an unusual L-shaped bathroom. The toilet and sink are on the left-hand (long) wall as you enter, and then the bath is side-on at the end of the room, spanning the width of the foot of the L, so with half of it obscured behind a wall. The reason for the L-shape is because of the stairs, which run alongside the right-hand side of the bathroom (hopefully that makes sense!)

We initially thought we might be able to reduce the headroom in the stairwell and create some space alongside the bath, but it turns out that there isnt enough headroom to do this. The only other option is to completely move the stairs over, but this would mean losing a large chunk of two bedrooms, so weve decided against this. The other option that a few people have suggested is to just have a walk in shower in the space behind the wall, but again, we have decided against losing the bath because the house is a 4-bedroom family house and we need a bath.

The bathroom itself works perfectly well. Its not huge, but a decent size (4sqm), and once you get used to it, the fact that half the bath is behind a wall is really not a big deal (also means that we dont have to have a shower curtain or shower door to clean!)

I am personally not bothered at all by it, but everyone who comes to the house comments on how odd it looks. We also suspect that this is the reason that the house took a while to sell.

So were trying to work out if there is anything we could do to make it look less odd. One idea was to put a wall-to-ceiling mirror on the wall next to the bath to reflect it back and fool the eye into thinking that it's seeing the whole bath. Im not massively keen on having a wall to ceiling mirror (and also suspect it would cost a fortune) but cant think of anything else that might work.

Any ideas?!

Mardle

Could you reduce the headroom over the stairs enough to be able to move the sink to the right hand side so that it looks as if it is on a vanity unit.

Gazelle1985

That would be ideal, but unfortunately there isn't enough headroom in the stairs to reduce it any more. We also thought we might be able to put the sink in the foot of the L, and turn the bath around so it's on the long left-hand wall, but unfortunately the room is too narrow, even for a small bath.

Mardle

This is the sort of thing I was thinking of

Gazelle1985

Ah I see what you mean. I don't think that would work unfortunately because the bath is too wide to go lengthways. This is the floor plan:



We don't want to lose any of the bedrooms or make any of them smaller, so we're looking for a non-structural solution to make the bathroom look better/bigger and the bath not to look so weird. Not sure that there is one though!!

Working_Mum

can you simply flip the bath so that it's head is at the same wall as the sink and loo? IT'd mean there is a void where the taps are currently but you could box that in somehow and make an access from the stairs for storage? Or simply have it as a void?

Gazelle1985

That's a good idea! There is a radiator next to the sink at the moment but I guess that could move into the void, or onto the right-hand wall. Will have to measure the width of the room when I get home to see if a 1300mm bath would fit...I suspect some of it will still be cut off, but it may look better...

Hoploz

You don't want a 1300 long bath! Keep it proper size, but shift the end to the left wall.

spadoosh

Moving the bath to the left will make the room look smaller. If the rooms is 4 sqm and the wall on the left is the longer (as it looks on the house layout) then its unlikely youll fit a 1300 bath without going in to the alcove.

I know a few people who decided a 1300 bath was better than just a shower. It just gets used as a rather elaborate and decorative shower base, they cant bathe in it at all.

I initially though just get rid of the bath and have a shower. If you went with something like a 900 x 700 shower tray it should give you enough room to swing your arms about a bit. You shouldnt be too far away from having it completely in the alcove. But then youve got issues with the window.


All in all it seems like a lot of work and effort for something youre happy with. Ok it might be odd to other people but youve not lived their long and would assume you at least plan on being there for a few more years. Whats the point?

Live in the house, get an idea of what works and what doesnt for you and then make plans. I think stair lifts look odd in houses. The reality is their practical for the occupant.

Theres lots of things that might mean you need to do work on the house anyway. (More) kids, caring for relative, new windows, damage to the property all of these might mean you can look at the 'issue' then rather than now. If you start doing work that might effect the bathroom thats when i would be thinking about it.

Gazelle1985

Spadoosh, I completely agree with you - it is a lot of work and effort for something we (or at least I, my husband is less keen) are happy with. The only reason we would be changing it would be to make the house more sellable and stop all the comments about how weird it is. As we're not planning on selling for a looooong time, maybe we should just not worry about it :-)

naf123

I don't think it would bother me , and it is a very good use of the space .

I don't know what's outside but I would rather save money for an extension than redo the bathroom .