Bath as it is today- half finished

The birth of a bathroom part one:

Planning and Demolition
We’ll start at the beginning.
The house was built as a duplex in 1908. I have owned it for eight years and lived there for three. It is packed with lots of tasty architectural details, natural woodwork, little balconies, a fireplace, a butler’s pantry, and tons of built-in nooks and window seats. I love this house but I don’t love the bathroom.

Bath Grievances listed.

  1. There is a weird box protruding from the floor. It forms a pedestal for the pedestal sink and presumably hides some sort of plumbing atrocity. To make matters worse the foot of the pedestal sink is not centered on the box so the sink appears to totter at the edge.
  2. The tub, a 60 inch clawfoot, juts into the room, so that the bathroom door connects with its metal hulk and evokes a baritone gong.
  3. The toilet is lazy.
  4. The flooring is vinyl laid over particleboard.
  5. All the trim is pressboard and likely to swell and buckle.
  6. The medicine cabinet is not centered on the sink, which is not centered on the box. Thus adding to the general aesthetic of wrongness.

Okay its not hideous. But after doing several tile-heavy bathroom renovations I am eager to upgrade.

In planning a new layout, I see three options. The window and door are centered on each other and roughly centered on their respective walls. There is 24 inches between the wall and the door where the tub will go- not enough for a standard 30 inch tub.
I can. . .

  1. Keep the clawfoot. ( I decide against this because I dislike having a plastic curtains on all sides and it makes the room look smaller/ messier.)
  2. Put a freestanding tub centered on the west wall- (I could only find one company making a tub like this and it was very modern and plastic.)
  3. Move the window 9 inches towards the eastern wall and make room for a corner tub that will be built into the wall on two sides and have a rounded back- (this type of tub was popular in the nineteen twenties and thirties)

I go with option three, which is unfortunately the most grizzly and invasive option.

Several things happened simultaneously to start the renovation.

  1. the attic tenant gives notice they will be moving out and leaving their bathroom free and clear.
  2. I found a corner tub in the fancy boutique section of the Rebuilding Center, ( boutique section means no bargains, no whining, just pony up the money.) It was $400 and it was battle scared. It had rust and chips. It weighted several hundred pounds

Four hefty fellows put the tub in the back of my pick-up truck. I drove it home and then immediately climbed in the tub and sat imagining the inaugural bath.

I told my live-in boyfriend that the pieces were falling into place. I was going to start the remodel.

“I like our bathroom,” he said.
“But the box? The gonging? The vinyl?”
He frowned “You’re going to destroy our home aren’t you?”
“Yes,” I said. “Yes, I am.”