Another bathroom question - making small en-suite feel larger?

[GrendelsMum]

We're just in the process of creating a small en-suite bathroom, 90cm wide by 3m long. The door is in the middle, to your left as you step in is the shower, and to your right is the basin, perhaps incorporating a little storage. Straight in front of you, between shower and basin is the towel rail.

I'm worried that it might feel a bit claustrophobic. Does anyone have tips on how to make it feel larger? We plan to have pale, warm grey tiles in the shower. I thought we might have two of the walls mirrored, so that there's both a mirror wall over the basin and a mirror wall in front of you as you walk in, but would it look odd?

I've looked all over for pictures of similar rooms, but haven't managed to find any inspiration. Please help, Mumsnet Gurus!

We have a tiny bathroom (8"x5") and have the door opening outwards to provide floor space.
If there's no window, then a mirror over the towel rail so you see it when you walk in would be good,and one at the side sounds good too.
Also nice lighting really adds to the look of a space.

The mirroring sounds a really good idea and will give an illusion of more space.We have a small bathroom and have gone for off-white walls and large wall tiles [again in off-white].A walk-in shower with a traditional shower and clear curved glass surround [no metallic fixings or edgings].The one thing we have made a feature of is the floor which is lemon marble [with fossils in].The floor is a warm grey so has the effect of making the floor area look bigger.Unobtrusive lights are best in a small room - again we have spots on a dimmer switch.Make sure the bathroom furniture is on the correct scale for the room [i have a humongous washbasin in the kids bathroom!]which was a total mistake.Go for a toilet with a push button in the top and a small sink [i always tend to go for a pedestal as the other ones look unfinished to me unless they are boxed in].

Ooh, thank you very much everyone. Lots to think about here.

In tems of sinks, I really like this one

www.plumbwales.co.uk/acatalog/Roper_Rhodes_Aurora_furniture.html

It's 900mm wide, though, so it would fill the entire side of the room.

DH thinks that would be too big, and we should go for something like this

www.ukbathroomstore.co.uk/roper-rhodes-envy-en600g-anthracite-washstation-600mm-p-154100.html

That's wall hung, so no legs, and is only 600mm wide, so would have 15cm on each side.

What do people think?

We have a similar sized ensuite in our loft conversion. I don't know if there is any reason why you are not putting a toilet in there, but I think you should, there is room, as somebody else mentioned have a small basin directly in front of you as you open the door and shower left and toilet on the right or vice versa.

If you are building from scratch, I would recommend a pocket sliding door (our sliding door system is by eclisse), with such a small space the door disappears into the wall when it is open.

Also, as ours is in the loft we have even managed to get some decent storage in there, the toilet is on the eaves side so we had a little cupboard built in above the toilet going into the eaves, it is quite deep so we fit a lot in there. We also have, I think you call it a vanity?, anyway a basin sitting on a cupboard, and a mirrored cabinet with storage. The toilet is slightly offset from the middle so the towel rail goes next to the toilet on the same wall as the basin if that makes sense.

The only compromise I feel we made to get everything in is the small basin, but it does not feel crowded when we get out of the shower to dry ourselves so I think we made the right compromise.

We added a similar sized ensuite in the corner of our bedroom. The door is in the middle of the long wall. On the left there is a built in cupboard with 4 drawers below, in white gloss to reflect light. We have a built in corner shower next to that in the back left corner. Along the back wall we have a round sink (maybe 45cm? Not at home right now!) set into a granite surface which runs across the back wall from the shower, with gloss white cabinets below. To the right of the sink is the toilet, with cistern built into the cabinet/hidden under the granite.

The whole of the back wall to the right of the shower is covered by a made to fit mirror.

To the right of the door (on the stud wall) we have a chrome wall hung radiator/towel warmer.

So we have loads of storage and a surface for toothbrushes etc.

The floor tiles are pale beige, with matching smaller ones in the shower for continuity. The granite is sort of pale brown/beige/pale grey speckled. I wasn't a fan of white gloss cabinets but they look great and I can store loads of makeup, towels, toilet paper, cleaning stuff etc. It's all very seamless!

Mirror walls as you've said

Wall hung fittings - loo, sink - to give more floor space. Hidden cistern if you're having a loo.

Large size floor tiles are best

You could make the floor tiles continue a couple of inches up the walls (called an "upstand" i think - like a small skirting board but made of tiles) - this gives the appearance of extending the floor

Definitely don't have any sort of border on the floor - it will make it look smaller

Light colours and lots of light of course!

Light reflective materials are also good, so go for sheeny rather than matt finishes.

Part glazed door is a good idea mentioned above

Door opening outwards definitely.

Don't have curtains or blinds, just frosted panel on window (you can get stick on stuff)

Downlighters rather than anything hanging or sticking out from the wall

Brilliant, thanks very much. I'll let you know the results!