Many homeowners are striving to improve bathrooms with modest proportions. Challenges for tight bathroom spaces include providing enough storage, creating a space that feels open and airy, and avoiding busy or cluttered looks. Here’s how five designers created beautiful bathrooms of 50 square feet or less.
Before Photo
1. A Two-for-One Bathroom Special
Bathroom at a Glance
Who uses it: A couple’s guests
Location: Arlington, Massachusetts
Size: 41 square feet (3.8 square meters)
Designer: Kelly McGuill of Kelly McGuill Home
Builder: Sequoia Custom Builders
Before: This Massachusetts couple had a large (170-square-foot) master bathroom that wasted a lot of space. It had two entry doors — one off the hall and one off the master bedroom. They knew they’d be better served by separate spaces. Interior designer Kelly McGuill divided the generous room into a private master bath for the couple and a hall bath for their guests.
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Photo by Tamara Flanagan
The new hall bath feels larger than its 41 square feet. Because the space is for guests and therefore doesn’t have the storage requirements of a bathroom used by multiple people on a daily basis, McGuill was able to use a beautiful marble pedestal sink that makes the room feel more open. Using lots of white also gives things a light and airy feel. The couple wanted a tub-shower combo to accommodate guests with little ones.
As for style, McGuill kept it simple and elegant. The clean lines of the tile, tub and sink have a crisp look. The marble of the sink makes a luxurious statement, while polished chrome accents add shine. The slate floor anchors the room in a dark color that contrasts with all the white. The running bond pattern of the long floor tiles emphasizes the length of the room and makes it feel wider.
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Becky Harris
2. A Bathroom That’s All His
Bathroom at a Glance
Who uses it: A married man
Location: Outside Atlanta
Size: 50 square feet (4.6 square meters); 5 by 10 feet
Designer: Michelle Fee of Change Your Bathroom
Before: This Atlanta-area couple decided to set up separate bathrooms for the two of them. They hired bathroom designer Michelle Fee to renovate one for him and one for her. Because this bath is located right off the home office where the husband spends a lot of time, it made sense for it to become his. The tight, windowless room needed updating and some lightening and brightening — and the husband was eager to give it his own personal style.
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Photo by Michelle Fee
Overall the house has a Craftsman-inspired eclectic style, so Fee kept that in mind when tackling the design. The dark-stained maple on the vanity she designed and the slate floor create cohesion with the rest of the house.
But the homeowner also wanted the room to stand out as uniquely his. He loves deep blues, so one challenge was incorporating those dark colors while keeping the room bright. Fee worked this out by adding blue accents in the otherwise all-white shower surround and by using white wainscoting beneath the blue paint on the walls. The husband also loved the idea of a vanity with an integrated sink. The warm brass Fee used on the faucets and mirror are a finish not seen elsewhere in the home.
Other clever solutions include using a tilt mirror so the owner can see more of himself in the small space. And the three-light sconce over the mirror with the lights pointing up toward the white ceiling helps reflect light, increasing the brightness of the room.
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Before Photo
Becky Harris
3. Contemporary and Airy With Smart Storage
Bathroom at a Glance
Who uses it: A couple
Location: Ottawa, Ontario
Size: About 45 square feet (4.2 square meters); 7 feet, 10 inches by 5 feet, 9 inches
Designer: Susan Ozipko of sO Interiors
Before: The hall bathroom in this couple’s midcentury modern house in Ottawa, Ontario, hadn’t been updated since the 1980s. It had served as the main bathroom for the whole family, but with their nest emptied the couple wanted to update it for themselves. Interior designer Susan Ozipko described its condition as “not user-friendly.” The tub-shower had bifold doors, there wasn’t enough storage and everything felt cramped.
sO Interiors
Photo by Becca Wallace Photography
Replacing the tub with a roomy shower stall made the room more functional for the couple. The flat-panel maple vanity and unit over the toilet give them plenty of storage. The bottom of the vanity has a large drawer for storing extra towels. And the wood material and style of these pieces nod to the home’s midcentury modern architecture.
The biggest space-saving hero is the wall-mounted toilet. Rather than protruding into the room, its tank hides behind the wall. (The flush panel can be removed for access.) The toilet bowl doesn’t take up floor space, also making the room feel airier.
The color palette and lighting keep things bright. One of the homeowners is a geologist, so the designer put a lot of thought into the natural stone tile choices. The shower surround is Statuario marble and the rest of the walls feature a stone mini brick mosaic in similar hues. Ozipko floated the mirror off the wall so she could add lighting behind it. And because the room was windowless, she added a solar tube in the ceiling to bring in natural light.
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Before Photo
Becky Harris
4. Contemporary Style for Two Sisters Who are Growing Up
Bathroom at a Glance
Who uses it: Two sisters, a teen and a tween
Location: Los Angeles
Size: 50 square feet (4.6 square meters); 5 by 10 feet
Designer:
Before: The two sisters who share this Los Angeles bathroom were entering their teen years and had outgrown the former space’s cutesy and dated style.
Photo by Erika Bierman Photography
Designer Wendy Wilson gave the new bathroom a clean-lined, contemporary look that fits in with the rest of the house. Its elements include a glass tile shower surround, a beautiful accent tile niche that serves as a focal point, and an edge-grain bamboo vanity with a speckled quartz waterfall countertop.
As for storage, the designer carefully considered how the sisters would share the bathroom. The shower has a large niche with plenty of room for both of their products. The train rack and recessed towel bar give them space to dry their towels and store extras. The tall vanity has six drawers and two cabinets doors. And each girl has her own recessed medicine cabinet.
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Before Photo
5. Guest Bath Goes From Dark to Light
Bathroom at a Glance
Who uses it: Guests
Location: Barrie, Ontario
Size: 50 square feet (4.6 square meters)
Designer: Laura Hay
Before: This hall bathroom had served the four sons of a Barrie, Ontario, couple just fine while they were growing up. But after the last of the sons moved out, the couple wanted to give the space a grown-up makeover for guests. They wanted the look to be relaxing and to flow with the rest of the traditional style of their home. And while they asked designer Laura Hay to lighten things up, they weren’t interested in an all-white space.
Photo by Stephani Buchman Photography
As a light alternative to white, Hay was inspired by the soft and soothing tones found in limestone. She replaced the tub-shower with a spacious shower stall. Enclosing it with clear glass lets in the natural light from a new transom window. She also added light through long wall sconces and recessed lights in the ceiling.
The boys will be back for visits, so it was important to have more storage space than the average guest bath requires. A custom vanity packs in plenty, and having just one sink frees up counter space. An additional cabinet over the toilet adds more storage.
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Photo by Stephani Buchman Photography
Elegant materials include Caesarstone quartz on the counter, around the window and here on the shower threshold. And Hay placed the same Moonstone marble mosaic tiles she used on the shower floor in between the large-format porcelain floor tiles.
How to Make the Most of a Compact Bathroom
- Consider an open sink if you don’t need all the storage a vanity affords. This option is more practical for a guest bath than for a bath used by multiple people every day.
- Incorporate a bottom drawer beneath a vanity’s cabinet doors to make the most of the storage capacity.
- Think about using wall-mounted toilets and vanities as well as clear glass shower enclosures to help a compact bathroom feel more open and airy.
- Look to medicine cabinets, space over the toilet and expanded shower niches for additional storage.
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