Bathroom Improvement Ideas to Use in the Home

bathroomideas

Improving the functionality of your bathroom can change your routine in the best way possible. It can also reduce the water use in your home, reducing both the water bill and the ecological impact of your bathroom. In other words, it’s both a smart and an ethical thing to do. However, which improvements are just there to make the place look better (which is a worthy goal on its own), and which are there to make the place more functional? Here are the top seven bathroom improvement ideas that will make your bathroom more useful and more resistant to change.

1.      Keep the layout

The most expensive, the most dangerous, and the least convenient thing you could ever do in your bathroom is to decide to change the layout. Why? Well, because this means changing the position of your fixtures, which requires you to tamper with the plumbing. It’s not like buying an appliance that you can fit in any available socket or an extension cord. For every new fixture, you need to lay an appropriate infrastructure, which means hiring the services of a professional plumber, which is not going to be cheap.

So, if possible, in any way, keep the layout and pick new fixtures. This will require a minimal amount of work, which is why the project will be not only cheaper but quicker. This means that your bathroom will be out of order a lot shorter, as well. To make the long story short, changing the layout is one of the biggest bathroom mistakes that you can make.

2.      Switch to low-flow fixtures

Going with low fixtures is one of the simplest but not necessarily the least expensive ways to innovate your bathroom. A low-flow faucet, low-toilet, and low-flow showerhead can, on their own, drastically reduce your home’s water bill. Moreover, they can make your home eco-friendlier.

The thing is that these low-flow fixtures are specially designed in order to provide satisfactory performance while spending considerably less water. This is especially important for fixtures like toilets, which are, alone, responsible for about 40% of all water use in households. It’s important to understand that these fixtures are something you use on a daily basis, which is what makes them so crucial. With the right bathroom accessories, you can rejuvenate your bathroom and make it more functional at the same time.

3.      Install a bidet

Installing a bidet is one of the best things you can do for your bathroom. The truth is that it saves a lot of money on water and toilet paper, as well as gives you a chance to make your bathroom habits more hygienic. It’s more comfortable, simpler, cheaper, as well as more eco-friendly, and of course, in case it is out of service, it’s easy to fix bidet toilets.

In other words, the only downside lies in the fact that the installation can be quite costly but even this can be remedied by buying a bidet seat instead of a whole bidet. Then again, some people have no previous experience with a bidet, which means that they have a problem understanding how all of this works, looks, and feels. Still, you won’t find any bidet user out there complaining, which is why it’s so important that you consider making this vital installation as soon as possible.

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4.      Small, textured tile on the floor

While some suggest that this is a good idea for the shower, there’s no reason why you shouldn’t use this flooring type for the whole of your bathroom. Sure, if you love to walk barefoot across the bathroom and are hypersensitive, this may be a bit annoying, however, there’s always a slip risk in the bathroom.

Ceramic tiles are, by their very nature, slippery and there’s no place where a spill is more likely than here. Even without a spill, condensing humidity and water dripping from your body and hands will do the trick. This is why, you want the floor that’s, at the same time water and slip-resistant. Sure, the maintenance of these tiles is harder than with standard tiles but it’s definitely a worthy trade-off.

5.      Improve your drain pipes

This may sound as trivial but switching from a 1.5-inch drain pipe to a 2-inch drain pipe can change everything. First of all, these extra 0.5-inches will drastically reduce a chance of a clog. So, if, at the moment, these drains clog easily. Second, the quality of drainage in your bathroom will also be improved quite significantly and all of this will be done with no downside.

You see, a wider drain pipe is not that more expensive. Even if the price margin was significant, this is a minor, one-time purchase that changes everything for the better. Keep in mind that clogs are one of the biggest concerns when it comes to bathroom maintenance, which is why this solution is so effective.

1.      Work on the light

By the very nature of the room, there’s really not that much light in your bathroom. A large window is never advised, seeing as how privacy is always a top concern. Well, this means that you have to be careful about choosing the best lighting for your rooms. The best way to do this is to focus on the concept of layered lighting.

This will allow you to dim the room in order to create a better ambiance or increase the intensity of light in order to brush your teeth, apply makeup, or shave. In other words, you get both Ambiental and functional light, both of which you need in your bathroom.

2.      Pick neutral fixtures

Another thing worth considering is the color of your fixtures. While you have the privilege to choose anything you deem fit, make sure that you remember that you probably won’t be replacing these for years. Leave some room for future adaptations.

For instance, the color of the shower curtains is something that you can change with a handful of dollars. You can also repaint the walls, as well as introduce a number of similar, smaller, changes. The last thing you want to do is pick fixtures that are dependent on your current color palette. While not necessarily bad, it narrows down your number of options quite drastically.

In conclusion                                                    

In the end, you need to look at all these investments from the standpoint of a financial decision. You see, a bathroom is an area of your home with large water use and moderate power use (when you take into consideration the water heater and all the appliances). This is why improving it can lead to lower utility bills and a smaller ecological impact. Moreover, by going for permanent (or long-term) solutions, you can make the ROI of this project much smarter. With all of this in mind, it’s clear that you need to put some thought into all this before the works commence.