Your bathroom is where you start and end each day. It impacts the way you feel in your home and plays an active role in your overall well-being. Don’t believe me? Imagine how you would feel in a beautiful hotel bathroom. The spa-like atmosphere is blissfully soothing, and in just a few short days, you leave feeling fully refreshed.

With a bathroom that speaks to your style and supports your lifestyle, this same feeling is possible at home. If yours is a far cry from feeling restful or supportive, a bathroom renovation may be in order. But…where should you start?

While most TV renovations start with the demolition of your existing space, putting on your safety glasses and grabbing your sledgehammer, though therapeutic, is not your best first step. You need to start with a plan. Renovating without one will create an extended timeline and lead you to potential costly mistakes, and I don’t want that to happen to you. 

Start by grabbing a pad of paper, your favorite pen, and a calculator. Today, I’m sharing the steps you will want to take to start your renovation and plan your investment…

Step 1: Decide Who Will Lead Your Bathroom Renovation

Your first step is to decide who will lead your bathroom renovation. There are 3 pathways you can choose from:

1. Hire a professional contractor

2. Do it yourself (DIY)

3. Use a mix of professional assistance and DIY

About Contractors: Hiring a contractor first gives you a jump start in the right direction. They oversee your project and provide you with the peace of mind that your investment is in capable and experienced hands. They are experts, and they can answer your questions with more depth and accuracy than Google ever will.

About DIY Renovating: You may want to attempt a DIY project after watching a few YouTube tutorials. I know they make it look easy, but as an experienced professional who designs and helps orchestrate renovations for a living, I can tell you that it’s not. I suggest adjusting your expectations to your DIY limits. In my experience, most first time DIYers don’t complete their projects, and the ones who do are usually unsatisfied with the result, which can cost more money in the long run. To help you make this decision, here are 5 things first-time renovators don’t expect. 

Mix Contractors and DIY: If you want to be hands-on during your project but know your limits, you can do a mix of professional contractors and DIY. Decide on the parts of the renovation you can do and know you’ll be pleased with the results — that’s your DIY. These might include tasks like painting walls, installing open shelves, or hanging new mirrors. 

However, some parts of a bathroom renovation are worth having professionals complete because they can be disastrous to get wrong. These include tasks like installing new plumbing (toilet, sink, bathtub, shower) and electrical fixtures, laying new flooring, refinishing your vanity, and tiling shower walls.

Design Tip: When working on the design of your bathroom, make sure everything has its place. For example, you can add a niche to your shower to store your daily products or install drawers instead of doors in your vanity, for easy access. An experienced contractor or interior designer can help you develop creative storage solutions unique to your space.

Step 2: Engage an Interior Designer

I know what you’re thinking, “Do I need a contractor and a designer for my renovation?” The simple answer is YES! Contractors manage the day-to-day operations like permits, demolition, construction, and following a design plan, but design itself isn’t their specialty. They won’t have an eye for colour, style, or even designing unique features that fit your particular lifestyle. (And remember, ugly costs just as much as pretty!)

If the look and feel of your bathroom is important to you, you’ll want a designer. Fortunately, you can engage an interior designer in several different capacities, depending on your budget and needs. 

Design Confidence: For example, in my 2-Hour Work Session, I will help guide you in finalizing your layout, mapping out your action steps for an efficient renovation, or helping you select some finishes (tile, counter materials, colour palette, etc.). This is an entry-level option to give you complete confidence in your project and in the final look and feel of the bathroom.

A Fully Designed Bathroom: However, I can also design your entire bathroom for you with my Bathroom Finishes Service. This includes a bathroom measurement guide, moodboard, and hand-selecting all materials that will go into your bathroom cabinet colour and style, counter material, bathroom hardware, all plumbing selections (sink, faucets tub, shower), shower tile selection, wall and trim paint colour, flooring tile, vanity lighting, and your mirror selection. 

A Fully Designed Bathroom AND Project Co-Management: This is what we call full-service interior design. It includes everything, from the design of the space to material selections to helping contractors order and receive materials, working with trades, and installing the final space. You get to enjoy the fun parts of a renovation without lifting a finger — and you will love the result!

Design Tip: Light, neutral tones add a sense of calm and cleanliness to a bathroom. Together, we can choose suitable neutral finishes, such as flooring shower walls and counters, with punches of colour you love via towels, art, or a pretty shower curtain.

Step 3: Determine Your Investment

You probably already have an idea for your desired overall investment, but how will you allocate those funds to various aspects of your bathroom renovation? How can you keep your budget on track as the project progresses? Great questions. 

If you decide to work with me, we will discuss these questions during our initial consultation together, guiding you in maximizing your investment for your goals. However, I would love to give you a head-start here. 

The chart below shows Save vs. Splurge price points for some of the most common materials in a bathroom. Use these numbers (and your calculator) to determine what quality of materials will fit your budget. 

Note: These factors are dependent on the quality of materials, labour rates, and layout changes. The chart is based on a standard 8’ x 5’ Canadian bathroom.

You can also save this chart, print it out, and highlight the items that feel right to you. This will aid your discussions with your interior designer, when shopping for materials yourself (if DIYing), or when deciding to engage other professionals. For example, if you know that a custom vanity isn’t in the budget, you won’t need a cabinet maker.

Step 4: Create Your Bathroom Design

Now that the budget is finalized, we’re ready to select the specific materials and features that will be going into your new bathroom. If you choose to DIY your project, I have you covered with my handy Design by The Numbers E Book that will guide you through all of the critical dimensions you need to know to create a beautiful space. If I am the designer on the project (with my Bathroom Finishes Service), I will put this together for you, including everything shared in Step 2. Although I will take the hard work off your plate (sifting through thousands of options to present you only with the best ones for your goals, budget, and style), this is a collaborative process. It’s your bathroom, and I believe you should have a say in it! We’ll work together to iterate and finalize a bathroom design you absolutely love. 

Using our selected materials and dimensions, you can then acquire quotes for labour like plumbing and electrical, cabinetry, and flooring.

Design Tip: I love to guide my clients in splurging on a focal point for the room. Every space should have a focal point, and the bathroom is no exception. Choose just one element to be your statement piece and make it shine, like a punch of colour on the vanity, a beautiful tile on the back wall of the shower, or a beautiful wallpaper feature.

Step 5: Order & Track Materials

Once materials are finalized, place your orders as soon as possible. You will need to have your materials on-site before starting demolition or construction. This decreases the amount of time you are living without a functioning bathroom, and many contractors simply won’t start your project unless the materials are there.

It’s also important to order early, because lead times have doubled since the start of the pandemic. For example, cabinets that usually took 6 weeks to arrive are now taking 12 weeks…and a lot of patience. You’ll want to keep track of your orders as well. Materials often go out of stock (again, the pandemic) and aren’t replenished.

P.S. This is another reason to have a designer on your team. Not only will I help your contractor with the ordering process by sharing all design specifications (with full-service design), but I can also help you quickly find a suitable replacement should items go out of stock or be discontinued, that will limit any delays.

Design Tip: Like every other room in the house, a bathroom should be well lit. Apart from the obvious vanity light or wall sconces on either side of the mirror, I like to include can lighting over the shower or wet areas. Another popular option is mounting an illuminated mirror or installing a window or sun tunnel for natural light.

Step 6: Schedule Your Trades

In theory, you will want to pre-schedule your trades so that you are on their calendar at the same time that all of your materials have arrived. However, with shipping delays, this isn’t always possible. Work with your specific contractors and trades to see how they prefer to navigate scheduling. The important thing is to get on their calendars and keep the lines of communication open so that your project is moving forward in one way or another at all times.

Again, if you’ve hired me for full-service design, I will be the liaison between you and your contractor and trades as they manage and carry out the renovation. 

Step 7: The Final Reveal 

Whether you’re doing this on your own or working with us, the final step is the big reveal…

Voilà! We make sure everything is perfectly installed and then style the bathroom with art and accessories to bring it all together. The result is a relaxing, personalized oasis ready for your everyday enjoyment. 

And there you have it — 7 steps, various ways to approach them, and tips you can use along the way. If there’s one final piece of advice I could give you, it would be to hire professionals, whether that includes me or not. When you hire professionals early on in your project, you are far more likely to get the design results you want, stretch your investment, and trust that your new space will last.

As always, if you need design support during this process, I’d be honoured to help. Book a complimentary 15-minute consultation call and let’s see if we’re the right fit.

Warmly 

Adrienne