Powder Room Design Part 1

Forgotten Spaces Series:  Powder Rooms (Part 1)





Let’s take a journey to another forgotten space in your home.  The Powder Room.  These little bathrooms are cute and quaint, but if they are located in an out of the way corner of the house, they sometimes get ignored. If we break this room down to its most basic components:  we have a toilet, small base cabinet and sink, a mirror and a vanity light fixture.  You know the lighting fixture I’m talking about, they look like Hollywood dressing room lights and I hate them.  See below:

BadLighting

Exhibit A: Public "Bathroom" Enemy Number 1

Seriously, is there anything more "blah" than these all too common light fixtures in your bathroom?  If you’ve recently bought a new home or moved into a home that has these lights, I recommend you switch them out immediately (if you have the means, of course.)  There are so many more decorative vanity lighting options out there.  No one should have to suffer with these. Whether your bathroom decor is modern or traditional, there are innumerable fixtures to choose from.

Ok, now that we can see, because we have our new light fixture turned ON, let’s talk about the largest feature of our tiny powder room, the base cabinet. The base cabinet usually sits right there as we enter the door.  And it probably takes up a significant portion of your powder room floor space.  If, however, you’re looking for a space saving, yet decorative option; consider an Elegant Pedestal Sink. These interesting small lavatories work perfectly in any powder room; even giving it a slightly upscale look. Can you think of anything more awesome than a shiney, porcelain pedestal? I mean, there’s the Pieta, the Mona Lisa and your Shiney Pedestal Sink.  The community aspect of the powder room allows more flexibility to use a pedestal sink, since no one needs a place to store their personal toiletries. The only thing to worry about is where to hide that extra roll of TP.  (Just in case you run out while on the can.)

BoringVanity
Very Basic, You can do better!

Perhaps a pedestal sink does not fit in with your decor or tastes.  There is nothing wrong with a Base Cabinet and Vanity in your Powder Room.  I mean, my plain, old, boring base cabinet and vanity with integrated bowl and 3" splash certainly is lovely (see above).  But we can get more creative than that.  Base Cabinets come in a lot of different styles and configurations.  If I were to upgrade my bathroom, I would look at one of two trends I’m noticing in powder rooms.

The first trend is a one piece base cabinet elevated on legs and clear space underneath.  They look like a piece of movable furniture.  These cabinets also have a higher counter top than your traditional base and vanity.  A standard bathroom vanity top sits at around 30 inches above finished floor.  These one-piece bases can have an average height of 34 to 36 inches.  I love this because you don’t have to bend over as far to wash your hands.  Yes, I wash them every time.

The second trend I’m seeing is a vanity base topped with a vessel bowl. A vessel bowl is basically a sink that is mounted to the countertop. It really just looks like a bowl on your counter, but I find them interersting and different. They come in all sorts of designs, styles and configurations. Vessel Sinks, however, require a taller Faucet because of the height of the bowl….(To Be Continued)

This article continues on (Powder Rooms Part 2)

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Posted in Bathroom, Forgotten Spaces Series, Interior Design

Powder Room Design Part 2

Forgotten Spaces Series:  Powder Rooms (part 2)

Continued from (Powder Rooms Part 1)




The last item you need to finish off your Pedestal Sink or Vanity Sink is a really great Faucet to bring water to your world. Just as the Pedestals and Base Cabinets come in all different styles and configurations, so do Faucets.  Its imporant to note that not all faucets fit on all sinks.  Some faucets have unique knobs on the handles. Some have twisting hot and cold knobs.  Some have levers.  So whichever interesting faucet design you choose, make sure it is compatible with the sink you buy.

If you’re going to have a sink, you will also need a item to help you fix your hair and put on your makeup. Yes, a Bathroom Mirror is vital to the powder room experience. Now, if you are like me, you may have a flat, frameless mirror that is glued to the wall above my my plain, old, boring base cabinet and vanity with integrated bowl and 3" splash.  And that is all well and good. But if we’re more design oriented with our new lights and sinks and vanities and stuff, we’re going to want a better mirror than that.  There’s no real thought provoking advice on selecting a powder room mirror.  But basically:  1. make sure it matches your theme, 2. make sure it fits the space that is alotted for it, and 3. make sure leaves room and compliments the the light fixture you put above or around it.

BoringToilet

Please, have a seat…your Highness!

Let’s consider the most likely reason we go into the bathroom: The Toilet.  No need to be blunt about it.  If you’re queen or king of your castle, you’re going to want a Great Throne.  Toilets, like every other plumbing fixture out there, come in some very unique and interesting designs.  Most people are fine with an every day, ordinary water closet.  However, you can get creative with some unique fixtures that fit well into your newly renovated or upgraded bathroom.

There are other things you may want to look into before purchasing a new Toilet.  This is not life and death stuff, but if you’re particular about details, it is worth knowing.  First, if you are concerned about water consumption, the toilet’s flush rate is worth knowing.  Most toilets have an average flush rate of about 1.6 gallons per flush.  Anything higher than about 2 GPF and that is getting on the high end of flush rates.  It most likely isn’t a problem if the toilet doesn’t get used a lot. The important thing is making sure the toilet has enough water to flush the solids down the drain.

The second thing to consider, and the bane of my existing, is the flaw in toilet seat design. I have some ordinary toilets that I can never get the plastic screws tight enough. The seat constantly comes loose.  This can make sitting a little hairy as the seat slides with slight movements.  Its not Mr. Toads Wild Ride or anything like that, but the seat is supposed to be stable. This may be a personal issue between me and my water closet, but I can’t believe that no one else suffers from this flaw.  Action Agenda:  Get a good seat.

The final thing to worry about, for you powder room, is the small accessories that round out your design. These items would include towel bars, hand towel holders and toilet paper dispensers. Again, there are always a very simple and inexpensive options that you can find in any hardware store. But if you’re passionate about the details of your home, there are many interesting options for upgrading its overall look.

So, if you have forgotten about that little powder room in your home and are thinking about upgrading it, you have many things to consider. Look at the overall theme and use that as a starting point for every design decision you make. Every piece of this puzzle should be chosen with care to create a cohesive look that builds on and compliments this space.  Styles, colors and decor are all unique to our personal tastes.   If you stick within your theme, you’ll put together a terrific space that helps the overal goal of enhancing Your Homescape.

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Posted in Bathroom, Forgotten Spaces Series, Interior Design

Bedroom Closets

Forgotten Spaces Series:  Bedroom Closets Need Love too!

A seriously forgotten space in your home is the bedroom closet.  It is not only forgotten by the owners of the closet, but also designers and architects.  Closets are an afterthought.  Your typical bedroom closet is a two feet deep by three, four, five, six feet long (or even larger depending on the bedroom size).  But the critical dimension is the two feet deep dimension because that is fixed. It actually takes up more space in the bedroom, because that two foot dimension doesn’t take into account wall thickness.  The front wall of the closet adds 4-7/8" into the bedroom (3-1/2" stud with a layer of 5/8" gyp. board on each side.)


 
As an architect, when laying out closets for a bedroom, you do your best to maximize the bedroom space. And because a closet is a requirement for the bedroom, the closet gets the proverbial shaft. I’ve laid out many bedrooms in houses, condos and apartments. Being keenly aware of how crucial storage is in a living space, it still gets put on the backburner of importance. Why? Frankly, because other spaces are more marketable. That still doesn’t alleviate the issue of our closets being important. So how can we maximize the 2 foot by whatever length we are left with? Organization.
ClosetLayout2
First, lets talk about how architects view closets.  Many times we are forced to draw the minimum due to square footage restraints.  It is usually the most efficient layout to allow the door to swing into the nook created by the closet.  (See the typical closet layout image above.) A solid line and a dashed line represent the Closet Rod and Shelf.  That is your basic closet.  Sometimes it has a steel rod and a wooden shelf and sometimes there is the cheaper wireframe shelves which are hated for the way they put lines in our folded sweaters.  Curse You, Wire Shelving, Curse You!

Let’s go vertical in our closet organization for bedrooms. There are ways to maximize your closet depending on what you keep in there. If you just keep clothes on hangers in there, that’s cool. But to quickly double the clothing storing capacity, think about stacking. Remove that single rod and shelf and consider a low and high rod and shelf combination.  The low rod is great for pants folded over hangers and the high rod is for shirts and blouses.  Make sure that he high rod isn’t taller than your reach or you’ll need a step stool.  And each shelf, if you have enough room, can be used to store folded clothes that aren’t worn as often.  Your sweaters probably won’t see the light of day until winter rolls around.

If you want your closet to be more than just a place to hang clothing, then you might want a more elaborate system of shelves, drawers, rods, etc.  Tall rods can be perfect for dresses and suits, shelves for folded items (like your unmentionables) and again, the systems of low and high rods for shirts and pants.  Cubby holes near the floor can be great for shoes.  You’ve seen these elaborate closet set ups in organizational and big box hardware stores.  Design a set-up for the way you use your closet. These systems are very flexible and customizable.
ClosetExample
The bottom line about the forgotten bedroom closet is realizing that you will find you need more storage after the fact. As you accumulate more shoes/clothes/stuff and discover you don’t have enough room to store it, you’ll want to maximize the space you do have. Remember that you can always go vertical. If you don’t, you’ll end up stacking clothes around your bedroom on the floor. You will be forced to forget how big your bedroom was. Walk-in closets can suffer the same fate if you have too much stuff. So, maximize that closet.

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Posted in Architecture, Bedroom Design, Closets, Forgotten Spaces Series, Organization, Storage



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