What colour would you paint a small, dark bathroom?

[DitaVonCheese]

The bathroom in our new house is very small and has a single, tiny, frosted, north-facing window. Suite and tiles will be white, floor will be bamboo. I can't decide whether to try to brighten it up or embrace the darkness and make it cosy. Any suggestions?

I can't find any remodelling software but have found one where I can draw it as it is at present (roughly) and can't really see what I could move, particularly as the loo needs to be in the same place because we're plumbing in another immediately below it. Will pop a copy on my profile in case anyone has any clever ideas :)

Have to admit I'm not loving that black bathroom, sorry but might google and see if I can find any more. You must also bear in mind that it will be full of DD's brightly coloured plastic tat!

Difference for me is that dark purple is warm, whereas grey isn't very.

Thanks for all the replies btw, I am reading them all! :)

Thanks for thinking of me Dita! That is really useful. We ordered EVERYTHING today so I'm now feeling quite relieved that we're through the endless catalogue flicking stage. In fact, I mustn't linger too longer over that gallery in case I get a new vision...

Just a paint colour to choose!

How about painting it a pale grey or blue and having accessories and towels in a gorgeous colour like hot pink or emerald green or something? Just a thought...

Thre's loads you could change! Cheapest and easiest would be to put the towel rail by the door and build a tall storage cupboard where the rail is now. I'd build wall to 2/3 the height of the room and say, 30 or 40 cm long, next to the non-tap end of the bath. Attach (glass) shower screen to that and build the cupboard to the same height. It doesn't have to be very deep to be a boon. 30cm would be fine, would give at least 120cm square of shelf space. Mirrored would be great, being opposite(ish) the window.

With the right fittings you might just even get a separate shower in without loosing the bath. Would undoubtedly be very expensive.

3D planning tool.

Deep purple is also good. 'tis only paint, if you tile to one height all round then it's a vet small area too. you can change the colour in an afternoon.

Please tile to a uniform height all round, it'd make such a difference.

I agree with Driven about using a dark colour, though I'd consider using dark grey tiles and a pale wall colour.
I remember a small shower room in a magazine where the (interior desinger) owner had done this and it looked very sleek/stylish.

Am not convinced about using white or yellow paint in North facing rooms I think they can look quite odd.

Also agree re tiling to the same height all around and looking at the layout before you decide.

Light blue or yellow, blue would be good with bamboo.

I used to do it as a job and bathroom designing is such good fun as they are really versatile spaces that really need so much from such a small space.

Some ideas for colours and space ideas check out:

www.utopiagroup.com/inspirations.html

I agree with previous comments that large tiles with less grout lines make the room look bigger and easier to clean. Im always a fan of a warm vibrant kimegreen as its clean, fun, goes with wood and white also kids fun colours and toys.

Let us know what you pick.

I'm having bathrooms redone as we speak but I'm on holiday and the fecking workmen can't seem to communicate with each other. Was hoping to go home to 2 finished rooms but doesn't even look as if 1 will be completed. < furious>

driven There's a massive cupboard immediately outside the bathroom door and will be another under the sink so probably okay for storage, and I don't want a separate shower as that's just more cleaning! Will think about the tiles.

Pannacotta was thinking of coloured tiles intially but we will probably be moving in five years or so and I thought white + easy to change paint would be more appealing to our successors.

Thanks cowboy will have a look :)

Good luck louise :(

Last quick q - painting walls and door and woodwork the same colour - yay or nay?

Nearly a nay... Nearly a yay!

Use the same tone but a different shade/colour works well

nee

woodwork white. actual white not hint-of-something whitr

mirror tiles on one wall or as accents between the white tiles?
I would tile most of the bathroom anyway, it*s so much easier to clean.

FWIW we have an internal bathroom with a sun pipe only, so not the lightest of rooms (though the sun pipe is amazing!)

We also were planning to sell so didn't want to be too "out there". Plain white suite of course - wall hung loo and basin for more sense of space. Expensive glass folding shower screen. Cappuccino (sort of a caramel brown) oblong tiles, with F&B Archive (cream) on walls and F&B Clunch (paler cream)on the woodwork (tongue and groove on side of bath, and hand-built wooden storage unit).

It always got "wows" from the estate agent valuations and the viewings.

Agree with you if going dark and dramatic it needs to be a warm darker colour...

Do grey/brown neutrals ever work in this situation? We have white tiles and a watery greenish/grey glass mosaic border. I don't want anything which will undermine the subtlety of that colour, so bright anything is out and all the creams I've tried are too yellowy. White seeems boring, but I'm afraid that greenish/greyish/beigey tones would be dingy in a north-facing room.

Sounds like you need to match your paint to the colours in your tile border - watery greenish/grey maybe?

I've never tried it, but Dulux do a colour-matching system where you'd take in a sample tile and they'd mix the colour to match.

Yep, I am thinking along those lines. Just worried that a big expanse of that colour would be depressing in northern light. I guess the room's so small that if we don't like it, we can change it straight back!

I've seen very small loos and bathrooms painted in quite dark colours but the walls are covered in artfully arranged b+w prints - family snaps or vintage style.

Looks very classy and relieves the unremitting expanse of wall (and gives guests something to look at!)

Had a windowless bathroom when we had a flat in London. It was fantastic.

Smaller than your bathroom, it had a mirror across the lenght of the bath, but above tiles, and the large tiles/floor were a black granite look (best I can describe it), so light bounced around. There were halogen spots.

The whole effect was cosy, sophisticated and with the lighting being done correctly, extremely flattering.

white white white.

agree re: larger tiles to make the space appear larger.

put colour in via accessories, towels etc, or a single tiling strip.

our bathroom is white 20*25 tiles with 'nightfall' strip (my mum maintains looks like gentlemans loo) and chrome taps, holder, shower riser etc...looks much larger than it did as beige/avocado 70s timewarp.

Can i mention it again? I have been going around threads crowing about it.

Thanks for the rest of the replies :)

Heartsease there are off-whites which might not be as yellowy as creams (though not sure about bathroom paint, seems a bit limited) or I quite like the idea of a greyish taupe, but no idea how it would look.

Took some of the current tiles out yesterday - I thought they were a dingy grey but they are actually quite a nice textured cream, the type I might have picked had I not known how rubbish they would look in there! Will look out for some big white ones I think.

Never heard of a sun pipe! We had halogen lights in our last bathroom and I hated them as they kept burning out. In current one we have only a single ceiling light - would quite like some wall lights as well but cannot face getting the electricians back to make more holes in the walls, so that might be it. Maybe some sconces and candles :)

sun pipe

I can't work out if that is insane or genius!

Dita that's what people usually say about me