Picture stepping into a bathroom so pristine and white it feels like someone might wander out with a sanitary cart at any moment. Yeah. I did that to my flat’s bathroom around two years ago.
Nice work there, Marcus. There had been a black mould situation going on for ages which meant I’d finally cracked and stripped the whole room down to the walls and started again. Teaching one of those jobs where when you walk through the door after work all you want to do is sit on the sofa and instantly forget about your day.
So spare rooms (let alone bathrooms) aren’t exactly high on the list of DIY projects. But my girlfriend and I were starting to really hate the old bath suite our flat came with.
Peachy-pink toilet cubicle installed during John Major’s second term?
Yeah, definitely needed replacing. My brain fuzzily latched onto the concept of minimalism around this time so “why not go full Netflix quirky-character-breaks-free-from-convention-by-moving-into-apartment-block- despite-parental-duty-to-rich-townsend-and-opts-for-complete-white-experience-instead” came into thought process. Why the hell not?
Sounds clean. Simple. Classy.
Boy, was I wrong. Sauntered down to B&Q one Saturday morning and bought the cheapest white bog roll available (“Brilliant White” if you must know). Piped three coats on to the walls, stepped back, admired my work.
Absolute paradise. Girlfriend comes downstairs, tells me it reminds her of the toilets at her old school. Great.
Paint choice was only the tip of the iceberg, it turned out. The problem wasn’t that it was white – it was that it was boring white. Bleached white.
Soulless white that sucked all warmth from the room until it felt unfinished. Clinical. Like the inside of St Mary’s circa 1998.
Nobody wants to visit your lavewhop just to watch you scrub toilets. The thing is, I’m quite stubborn. Also I’d already spent my weekend rolling paint around the room so obviously decided I just needed to give it time to “develop its character”.
Spoiler: it never did that. Every. Single.
Day. for the best part of six months, I’d stare despairingly into the soulless white abyss that used to be our bathroom whilst debating with myself over whether I’d made our already small bathroom feel even smaller. Thankfully I didn’t just rip everything out and start again. I evolved the room slowly; replacing cheap things with cheap-ish alternatives and learning vital lessons about interior design as I went.
If I had to start somewhere, I’d point you towards the shower curtain. Old one had seen better days (fun fact: our shower had given me some particularly gruesome brown stains I wasn’t aware were possible up until this point. Had to be smoothed over, obvs).
Replaced with this classy cotton waffle- weave number from John Lewis – reduced, of course. Teacher salary ain’t gonna spend itself. Suddenly things had depth.
Little squares reflected light from our tiny bathroom window, casting thousands of tiny shadows that broke up the pristine white walls and actually gave your eye something to focus on around the room. Isn’t science fun? Turns out when you rip every surface apart and repaint everything it kind of forces you to think about textures for the first time.
Mirror was flat. Walls were flat. Even towel rail was just flat shiny metal with no obvious creases for the light to play off.
Ever been in a laboratory? Same vibe. But once I started looking for them, textures were everywhere.
Think about that medicine cabinet I spent weeks staring into despair. Original was some cheap hollow rectangle that felt like it was completely lost against all that white. Swapped it for a rectangular cabinet with beveled edges; not enough to look fancy but just enough to throw shadows when the light hit it at weird angles.
About forty quid from Wickes. Life changing. Did the same thing with cabinet handles.
Bleugh. Standard shiny chrome was NEVER touching our walls again. Spent a good few hours stroking cabinet pulls in homeware shops wondering what would warm up all that glorious white space (am I the only one who does this? ).
Ended up going with brushed brass that had a slightly hammered finish on them; shiny enough that the room didn’t feel like a prison cell but muted enough that everything just felt warm. Snapped these babies up as soon as I saw them. Absolute game changer.
One thing I wish someone had told me about painting everything white: it doesn’t actually cover those old walls. Ha. Hypothetically speaking, I mean.
White isn’t white. Sure, it is white. But there are approximately 658722349 versions of white and they all look completely different when you chuck them next to each other depending on what lights you’ve got in your room.
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Bear bought us this offcut cork board from IKEA to test the waters behind the scenes and almost dropped it in horror when she realised the different whites we had kicking around actually looked LIKE DIFFERENT COLOURS in our bathroom. One was so pink it made me feel sick. Another looked grey.
THIS WAS SUPPOSED TO BE WHITE SPACE FOR FUCK’S SAKE. Mind. Blown.
Back to what actually worked. The stuff above the sink is a funky wooden stool from IKEA that I used for storage. Painted it white, yes.
But used a paint that actually showed off the wood grain underneath rather than smoothing everything out. Little bits of texture make such a difference when you’re staring at a white box all day. Trust.
Also picked up these ceramic soap dispensers from TK Maxx that had a matte finish and felt like smooth river stones in your hands. Colour Co-Ordinated. Texture CONTRASTED.
PLANTS. God, plants were the worst. Thought I could f*ck around with a snake plant at first but they looked ridiculous against all that white.
Too pointy. Too big. Looks like you’ve got a f*cking giraffe inside your toilet cupboards for pete’s sake.
What actually works was this stupid pothos in a plain white ceramic pot with drainage holes. Baby’s surviving so far. Hallelujah.
Extra light was SO IMPORTANT and tbh I didn’t realise how bad it was until I fixed it. Original bulb was this harsh glare that bounced off every surface and amplified how sterile everything looked. Picked up this battery powered LED light strip from Amazon that lives under the cabinet and basks everything in glorious, warm light.
All of a sudden your white walls don’t look white. They look cream. Amazing.
Paint finish matters, guys. Don’t cheap out. Stupidly tried matte paint first because the tin was cheapest but a bathroom painted in all matte everything is just asking formarks that’ll never buff out.
Swapped to high-gloss after that which was equally practical but made the room feel cold. Ended up going half-and-half; eggshell for walls and semi-gloss for skirting boards. Tiny difference in sheen but enough to subtly separate them from each other.
Storage solutions double up as decor these days. White wicker baskets from IKEA store spare loo roll and toiletries but add another texture to the room without compromising on our lil’colour scheme. Also picked up this random white wooden ladder display thing from IKEA that leans against the wall holding rolled-up towels.
Functional and easy on the eye. Guessed bathroom floor would be my white wall game changer and ya girl was right. Instead of opting for flat white tiles, we went for white subway tiles with a herringbone pattern.
Same colour palette but completely different attitude. Pattern creates movement and direction which tricks your brain into things there’s actual depth to what you’re staring at. Angled edges also mean it catches light throughout the day.
There’s something about layering different shades of white next to each other that just WORKS. Sat next to cream next to off-white and your brain automatically fills in the gaps, giving your retina something interesting to look at. Sound vague?
Imagine a song. Same note played on a piano, guitar, saxophone and trumpet. Completely different sound despite being technically the same.
If you play with enough instruments, it stops sounding boring. Who’d have thought it, but our white bathroom actually feels warm now. There’s literally hundreds of different types of white out there so once you find a couple that compliment your room and source of natural light, you can make your eyeballs damn well happy.
Texture.
Layering. Light.
Got my three Ps down pat. Loads more friends come over and compliment the bathroom these days. Never.
Once. Bloody. Happened.
With my crisp, clinical, lovely-for-no-one cowboy sanctuary we once unknowingly curated. Same room. Same colours.
Just science.
