Ready for a half-bath remodel? It’s that room with a toilet and a sink, sometimes called a utility room and sometimes referred to as a powder room.
Today’s post is sponsored by Kohler.
Why Should You Do A Half-Bath Remodel?
Chances are your half bathroom is one of the most used bathrooms in your home. If it’s popular, the hardware and fixtures get used a lot and eventually, they will begin to wear down! That’s exactly what happened in our house.
At that point, it was better for us to do a half-bath remodel and update the whole thing than to piecemeal it until it all fell apart.
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Who Should Do Your Half-Bath Remodel?
There are a lot of ways to go about renovations at your home. If you are handy you can do the parts that you know how to do, and hire a contractor to do the rest. As far as plumbing and electrical go, we will sub that part without a question. Everyone is different.
The flip side of this is that you can do a half-bath remodel and do nothing other than choose great fixtures for your bathroom and hire someone that is a professional to come in and do the renovation from start to finish. Your half-bath remodel is all personal preference.
Real Reasons That We Updated with A Half-Bath Remodel
It seems like yesterday that we moved on into our home and honestly it’s not that long ago, but things need to change.As you might know, a first floor, main living area, a half bathroom is a very popular spot with a family of five!
Overall this room has been the ‘ugly duckling of the house. The fact that it’s right off the kitchen and lacks anything special is the starting point. But that’s not why we took the plunge because after all, you can close the door.
Malfunctioning Fixtures & the Need for a Half-Bath Remodel
The cheap contractor installed toilet clogs frequently, and we’ve replaced the flushing hinge enough to have already purchased a new toilet! Should we discuss the toilet seat that just won’t stay tightened? But wait, there’s more…the hot water faucet handle leaks so it had to be turned off. No hot water? With all of these things going wrong, it was time to do a half-bath remodel.
7 Impactful Changes For Our Half Bath Remodel
Renovating an existing room is as much about the style as it is about using the space better and making sure it is functional, unlike our space in the half bath now!
Issues that we had that mandated the half-bath remodel:
- no storage (we’ll get some!)
- broken toilet (the new one flushes!)
- Broken toilet seat (this one won’t slide around nor slam)
- inadequate lighting (self-explanatory)
- Fresh Paint – Always finish a room project with some freshly painted walls
- Disliked the flooring (Digging out a toilet means a trashed floor! Replace it)
- No notable fixtures (fixtures make bold statements)
The Upgrades For The Bathroom and Why
I do not even need to go into this too much other than the toilet was less than appropriate for an adult backside, and there was NO storage in the bathroom.
A pedestal sink may look pretty but it does not function well for a family of five or guests when you need to store cleaning products and fresh hand towels.
Shop The Look: Using Our List Of All The Half-Bath Remodel Fixtures By Kohler My Husband Installed
The Half-Bath Remodel: Toilet Talk
TOILET
There really is just no comparison. The structure and its sleek look to the fact that the toilet actually flushes makes it superior to our old contractor-grade toilet. We installed a KOHLER Memoirs Toilet and it really defines the space with its rectangular tank top and a lovely rectangular and line inset base.
Notice too, that the OVAL space for sitting is generously appointed and please look at the trip LEVER which is oil-rubbed bronze and STURDY. The tank itself is the strength to the look as it uses its lines to define the space. The color is dune.
The Memoir toilet is a one-piece toilet that has both a bowl and tank. Really, the solidness of the toilet is about the comfort of which you sit upon. Plus, our gallons per flush are 1.28. The toilet seat is a Glenbury Quiet-Close seat with Quick-Release. The deal here is simple, no more slamming toilet seats when the kids use the bathroom, it is not going straight down (LOVE THIS)!
A Half-Bath Remodel & An Effective FLUSH
The way a toilet flushes is either fabulous or it sucks, and ours sucked. I will elaborate a bit more on this and why this toilet earns the power of flushing top billings from me!
Let’s talk flushing because I am always transparent when sharing our projects! However, I will qualify this and share that this may be a little TMI as the power of a flush is a beautiful thing. So, the single-flush gravity on this siphons during flushing so when you get one of those less than illustrious moments where you ‘gotta go’ and it’s not solid, you will totally appreciate the power of the single-flush!
It’s all in the “AquaPiston canister allows water to flow into the bowl from all sides (360 degrees), increasing the power and effectiveness of the flush.”
Solution In The Half-Bath Remodel To A Sink With No Storage
This Sink Has Storage! The old and the new, is there really even a comparison? Meet the Tresham Vanity and what I tend to refer to as my all-in-one storage unit. I love the solid look of the vanity. And the KOHLER Tresham One-Piece Surface and Integrated Bathroom Sink.
Our corner space posed a true challenge because I could not go as LARGE as I wanted to. Luckily we were able to do this from corner to corner with no room to spare. Now there is storage and a larger sink. If you remember, using ALL the space was one of the goals!
The Fixtures Create A Pop Of Color In Our Half-Bath Remodel
Faucet Fixtures allow for a POP of color to accentuate the boldness! Finally a little bit of personality in the powder room! We installed the Artifacts column lavatory spout and Artifacts swing handles are what finish the bold look, leaving it timeless and sleek. Part of the idea when renovating is to change things. Blah to Ah! Well for our half bath remodel DIY, I used the Artifacts collection to provide that accent!
The door is double-paneled and has plenty of storage for not only the plumbing which is housed in there (keep that in mind) but also towels, wipes, and extra toilet paper. This piece took the renovation from Good to Great.
It’s not just about the bathroom fixtures, but the bathroom accessories. A well-defined space defines its space. As you can tell I went from oval and small, to bolder with sleek defining lines of rectangular descent. I did this to FILL the space and define it. The room is small, but it appears larger with the right color combination as well as fixtures. A small oval sink was replaced with a rectangular, deeper bowl and awesome handles that provide strength to the lines.
Add In Lighting Fixtures and Mirrors To The Half-Bath Remodel
The lighting plays a key role in the appearance as does the mirror. Let the photo speak for itself, but let me provide you the names of the accessories so you can ‘get the look’
- Mirror
- Artifacts TP Carriage (yes we know we hung it differently),
- Devonshire double sconce
- Artifacts towel ring
Our Half-Bath Remodel Included Fresh Paint and A New Floor
To complete the update we changed the floor to a neutral ceramic and gave the wall some color instead of basic white! I darkened the paint to a more rich taupe in order to embellish the oil-rubbed bronze fixture pieces.
Last, I purchased light plate switches to coordinate the look and you can see them in the mirror versus the old white ones. This brought the look together.