Showing posts with label Bathroom. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Bathroom. Show all posts

September 11, 2013

Resource Links for Renovating and Decorating




For our references I collected resource links which can be helpful and inspring when renovating and decorating, including some local sources:





BATHROOM
You might be interested in bathroom related posts on Palazzo Pizzo



KITCHEN

You might also like all kitchen related posts on Palazzo Pizzo



ITALIAN FURNITURE

You also might like Palazzo Pizzo's furniture posts.



INTERNATIONAL DESIGNER FURNITURE


FOR OUTDOOR - TERRACE, GARDEN, BALCONY



HOME FURNISHING BARGAINS


FLOORING

You might be interested in all posts about flooring and tiles on Palazzo Pizzo



LIGHTING

You might like lighting related posts on Palazzo Pizzo



ART



Please note: this is my personal resource link list that I compiled during our project (I have not received any money from any company for any text link above, and there is no affiliate link in that list).

(updated September 2013)

March 14, 2012

Before and After: How a tiny 2,6 m2 overhanging Toilet became a pretty Kids Bathroom


A bit over a year ago, I was planning the tiny overhanging bathroom that measures 1,4 m x 1,9 m (2,66 m2). Originally it was just an "outhouse" with a toilet, a bidet and a sink. But we wanted to install a shower - in order to have an "en suite bathroom" for our son's room.

And I have to say, I am really happy with the outcome!

tiny kids bathroom 2,6 m2

I had told Angelo (our "capo" and my father-in-law) that his grandson would like to have a "green" bathroom. And, that I like "subway" tiles. I designed the tiling for the floor and the walls. Angelo over exceeded our expectations by adding a stucco ceiling (that was not there originally)!

Since the sink is right below the window - where you have a nice view in the neighbours garden and over the sea - we needed to have the mirror installed beside the window.

Our young son does not use a mirror so far... So, I do not know whether this beauty mirror is too small or not. But it looks nice! It has the right size for this bathroom.

shower area 80 x 80 cm

If you wonder why we have a rain shower installed in such a small bathroom, then because we probably made a mistake when ordering the shower equipment back in China, where we were living at some point - a couple of years before this bath renovation.

But we were lucky, it just matches the height.

  small compact toilet
For the sink, I researched online the different sizes available for different models. At the end I choose a Duravit Strack 3 model, they have a lot of options. It is important for a small area to choose the largest possible sink - as it is a hassle to wash hands in a sink that is too small.

I even asked Angelo to sit down on the toilet (that was already delivered) and measure the space between his knees and the wall to make sure, there is still enough space between toilet and sink.

The two short blue tubes that stick out of the wall next to the toilet are the pre-installation for a water spray. In Italy it is common to use bidets in private bathrooms. But with the installation of the shower we really had no more space for a bidet. So we opted for the space saving water spray - yet to come.

The floor tiles are layed diagonally in order to optically strech the room.

"spider" shower curtain holder and "fish" hooks
In a shop in Vibo Valentia, we found these green "fish" hooks. There were only two left and I bought them. Angelo fixed them behind the bathroom door. In another shop I found the "spider" that is a space saving Italian solution for hanging the shower curtain.


And here is the old bathroom, BEFORE renovation, as we found it when we bought the house:

BEFORE toilet with bidet
The toilet itself was also very tiny before and squeezed into the left corner. The bidet was eliminated for our new bathroom layout. The sink was moved below the window to give space on the right corner for a small shower.

BEFORE renovation
The only thing that was bigger in this bathroom before the renovation and became smaller after the renovation, is the window! Strangely, the window frame is so massive that the new window is much tinier. Well, these are things you encounter when renovating, whether you are on site or thousand of miles away.

"outhouse" or overhanging bathroom
Our palazzo is over 200 years old, and at that time an outhouse toilet was common in European cities. You can still sea the remains on the side of many palazzi in Italy. But of course the toilets nowadays are linked to the public canalisation.

July 23, 2011

no title

For this post I have no title.
Or should I call it "my strangest summer holidays ever" or "lost in renovation"?

Since ten days - this is how long I am now in the South of Italy - I am telling myself, this is only a short phase, we are going to move in soon, tomorrow, maybe, and tomorrow I am telling myself the same thing, we are moving in tomorrow, domani, magnana...

But what do we do in the evening without light in the living room? Or at night in the bathroom? Okay, lets buy lamps. Of course, CC does not want to spend his holidays buying lamps, so we buy all in once... not sure how many dozens we bought in one afternoon – mainly wall lamps (applique).  Is it only our team of electricians or do Italians in general have a passion for wall lamps?

wall lamps for the whole house

Luckily we found a shop similar to IKEA that has quiet a good choice (Semeraro at Lamezia's Due Mare shopping center). Of course we did not only buy lamps. Also adapters, plugs and jacks to harmonize Asian and European lamps and appliances with the two Italian systems of electric plugs we both have spread irregularly all over the house. - And hooks, we also bought lots of hooks and mirrors for six bathrooms...

red bathroom: mirror installed (inherited from mother-in-law),
matching lamp hopefully found
(in this room the camera failures always!)

May 24, 2011

A Bathroom Vision in Blue

A dream of a bathroom! How colours can change the atmosphere! Actually it is not just painted blue walls, it is spatulato, a Venetian technique for making painted walls shine like marble.

a vision in blue

blue and pearl grey wall colour harmonizes two different pattern of Vietri tiles on wall and floor

the lighter blue of the ceiling matches one hue of the wall tiles

the wall paint reduces the strong contrast (see before here and here)

stucco borders frame the painted areas

view from above (while painting the ceiling)

beautiful perspective of a blue bathroom dream

A "specialist worker" waxing the surface of spatolato finish in order to obtain a surface similar to polished marble.

Bath room with spectacular sea view

I wish I could be there! I have not seen it in reality yet. I only have these photos for now and have to wait for summer. 

What a dream in blue!

Grazie Angelo!! You are becoming the new Michelangelo with this project! Thank you for choosing the right blue and for spending so much time on the spatulato technique.

May 10, 2011

Colour Testing for the Masterbath and first Results

You might remember my wild mesmerising Vietri tile combination in our master bathroom (and here). There were doubts if it should remain like that with white walls. Or whether we paint the walls in a deeper blue at the same hight as tiles end behind the sink and toilet. - Let's try it out we said:

greenish paint from the 1st colour testing in the  living room

Although, we had a deeper blue in mind, I saw during the colour testing in the living room, that the greenish paint would perfectly match the wall tiles in the masterbathroom. If we would not use it in the living room, we could use it up here.

view from further away

But the floor tiles are totally different and the contrast to the wall would be even bigger than it is already now. That's why we had already bought a blue colour sample to try out in the bath. It is the same metallic antique type paint we are using in the living room.

metallic "antique" blue paint

Nice try. But the metallic effect is too strong in this bright room and the blue does not really match the floor either. Angelo had to cover the trial again with white paint and find a new solution. We did not dare to ask him to do a "spatulato" wall. This is a traditional Venetian finish. Originally made with chalk powder, oil, natural glue from animals and natural pigments. Nowadays, acrylic or vinyl resin is used, but it still requires a lot of work. But Angelo proposed it himself!

spatulato finish 

This is the only photo Angelo has send from the wall. I guess, at that time the other walls were not finish or the room was still too messy to shoot a photo from the entire room. 

bathroom ceiling

But we have ceiling photos. It is a light blue, but not as light as used before in the piano terra for the ceilings of the entrance #37, the kitchen and the window's niches. I asked him to match the blue a bit with the blue of the wall tiles. I think he used the same hue as used on the ceuiling in the corridor in front of the green bathroom. And this is perfect!

bathroom walls and ceiling

A white stucco border was added on top of the mid-hight tiled wall and runs now around all walls. The colour of the ceiling is taken down on the wall to form an app. 20 cm wide border. This reduces the felt hight and is supposed to make the room cosier. This blue border is also limited by a stucco border, that is however a bit wider than the first stucco border. Inbetween the walls Angelo used the same "pearl" white or grey paint as in the living room. The grey colour is supposed to look warmer than a plain white.

I am myself curious how the wall looks behind the bath tub and on the opposite site! Angelo, please send more photos!

April 10, 2011

Top 10 Impressions from the Renovation Work

In the last five days I have taken many pictures from the house and the work progress. Every day, I am on site measuring, looking into details, unpacking, helping whatever I can do. Yesterday, while showing friends around, I realized that I have some new favorite spots that I want to show you too:

My first favorite spot is the small sunny piazza infront of the house.
Here, at the main entrance three generations of (future) inhabitants are posing happily.

Angelo's art work at entrance #37

more stucco and paint art work on ceilings

my favorite bathroom in the vaulted cellar

March 30, 2011

Sneak Peek into the Blue Bathroom

Our sixth and last bathroom seems to become a new highlight of our renovation project :

a shower inside a niche of blue mosaic

sanitary equipment not installed yet, vaulted natural stone ceiling restored

blue tiles on opposite wall, natural stone wall restored

March 24, 2011

Work Progress in Pizzo

Angelo decided to give his new light sky blue ceiling an apricot framing

The sixth and last bathroom will be a blue bathroom - it's the one in the guest residence

waterproofing of last bathroom floor (seminterrato)

February 03, 2011

Moroccan Lamp for bathroom

I just came across this Moroccan chandelier and thought THIS IS THE ONE for my hot red bathroom.

Only problem:
the two light sources we have might not be suitable:
- one is on the wall above the mirror
- one is at the ceiling, not that high, and door opens that way

Otherwise it would be perfect... we could smoke water pipes in the bathroom and stay all day staring at the beautiful shadows on the walls!


Source: lamp by this shop via Lisa's natural modern interiors blogpost about Turkish and Moroccan lamps

January 31, 2011

The red Bathroom

After a turquoise bathroom, a wild Vietri tile mix bathroom, a green bathroom and a tiny overhanging bathroom we now also can offer a red bathroom:

a WC in a cosy niche

the shower is in another niche, a space that was taken way from the bedroom to get a full bathroom out of the former restroom - between shower and sink comes a radiator (also for towels)

what about a rectangular mirror mounted upright ?


You see, the bathroom is not finished yet, but I cannot wait, I have to post these pictures to show the progress, since it's the guest bathroom and guests have booked their flights....

This standing WC has apparently no mounting height level problem. The shower will be - I forgot - one of those we bought in China (while living in Beijing). The red mosaic was chosen by my creative husband after I had run out of ideas. Also the flooring. He said he does not want just green and blue bathrooms (!)

Some previous posted pictures of the red bathroom can be found here - the name and source of the tiles as well as some old BEFORE pictures here.

January 30, 2011

What you have to know about WC mounting

When I was discussing with Angelo via mail about the appropriate size for a sink in the tiny bathroom, I asked him whether one could sit on the toilet without having a knee squeezed by the sink in front.

My calculation went kind of sort of like this: "Assuming the sink is mounted at 85 cm height, the sink bowl itself is 19 cm (according to manufacturer technical data sheet) and the toilet is mounted at 40 cm we have 26 cm minus toilet seat for the knee. This should be okay."

The next email that I received from Angelo was no good news and he sounded furious. Why? After having checked the tiny bathroom he found that the WC can only be mounted at 38 cm height, which is perfect for this case, he also had found that in two other bathrooms the plumber had prepared the toilet pipes far too low and that we would need to reopen the walls for adjustment!
However, one of the bathroom is already completely tiled!

technical data (by Duravit) for our WC

Bad News: toilet pipe installation too low !

You even can see from the picture that the toilet installation on the wall is low. In fact the mounting height would be only 35 cm. (With the recommended 40 cm you have 8 cm between floor and the toilet for cleaning, see technical data picture).

How this could have happened? It's the floor level that had changed tremendously in some of the bathrooms. I think in the green bathroom we raised the floor around 20 cm. Same happened in the bathroom in the basement. Apparently the plumber was not informed about the exact floor level - or the floor level was raised too much ? I think in the basement the later happened since we also planed to have a rain shower in a niche, that all in a sudden became a very low niche ... different story.

This coming week, Angelo will have a word with our plumber and architect. I am curious how to solve the problem. In the basement where the walls are still concrete, it should be no big intervention. And for the green bathroom I hope we do not have to demolish the wall with the SICIS (!) mosaic... If it is only for the cleaning and not for the function, I would probably leave it at 35 cm.

Since I am talking dirty, I mean, toilets, I would like to mention how important some centimeters / inches of a whole in the wall can be regarding WC seating height and comfort! Very important for comfort! In my first renovation back in Germany I had one toilet mounted at 43 cm height. For me it was quiet uncomfortable, since you sit at about 45 cm (including the seat). With the second renovation back in Germany I worked with the same plumber and told him right away for my new WC that I want to have it at 38 or 39 cm. (With the result, that my mob did not go fully underneath anymore. Just a few mm were missing.) So one would think with the 3rd renovation I should have known !!

BTW, in our former home in Beijing and now in Bangkok we have WCs by American Standard (stand alone pieces, not wall mounted) and they have seating height between 37 and 40 cm. Very comfortable. And thinking of the squat toilets, popular around Asia, which my Chinese doctor considers to be more healthy than the Western toilets (he thought digestion wise not hygiene), one should have a WC mounted as low as feasible.

January 25, 2011

Sink Thinking

After a month of holiday in tropical Thailand, Angelo is back on site. For the newcomers to this blog, Angelo is my father-in-law, which he is since 11 years now. We are lucky that he has time to supervise the renovation and not only supervise but also works hard on it. I hope he had a pleasant holiday ;-)

He just arrived and already found emails from me asking this and that. So for the tiny bathroom (190 x 140 cm), we still think sinks. To help with my decision, Angelo had the idea to position the already delivered sink from the basement here between the compact toilet (360 x 474 mm, not mounted yet) and the shower (80 x 80 cm). (Sorry for not having it in inches).


The above picture shows the Starck 3 sink that is 600 x 450 mm. It seem that the window sill (not in the picture, see previous post) has the same length. It would look good, when window and sink are in line, that the sink is not that much shorter then the tiny window above. However, this sink is too big!

And the toilet seems to me a bit too close to the wall, a few cm to the right would be more comfortable. In total 10-15 cm would be enough. The blue stuff coming out of the wall on the right side of the toilet provides hot and cold water for the hose (with spray head).

So I looked into my files and made a final drawing of the three last sinks that are still in the race. But not much longer. I feel that the Happy D (460 x 345) is too small. And the medium Starck 3 (550 x 370) has as well not much larger inner bowl (only 470 x 215 inner measurements, to wash your hands in). So I opt for the larger version that is 550 mm long and 430 mm deep. Which would be just a bit smaller than the sink in the picture above. About 2,5 cm on each side which is probably the frame. 


Any other suggestions, ideas?
How important is the sink in a bathroom? I would say the equipment most often in use. That's why it should not be too small even when the space suggests a tinier one.

January 20, 2011

The tiny overhanging bath or former outhouse needs the perfect sink

Can anyone tell me how they called these overhanging shithouses people used to have in the medieval times in European cities ? (and elsewhere ?) I do not even know the Italian expression for these tiny outhouse loos.

Anyway, we have one! And it is going to be our son's bathroom.
In my previous post I gave a sneak peek into the ongoing renovation. It is another green bathroom. We have ordered all appliances, except the sink. Advise is welcome!

But look and read from the start:

front facade of the house with the overhanging former outhouse on the right

 
a closer look at a BEFORE photo (we came a long way!)

above drawing by the architect shows the former privy on the right

the layout says the WC is 1,90 m x 1,40 m


above and below is the BEFORE bath,
there were a WC (left corner), a bidet and a sink


we took out everything (please note the "big" window)


with the help of an AFTER pic (note the former big and now shrinked window!)
I made some tiles planning




And finally, see and enjoy what Angelo made out of my amateurish drawings :