Can we deviate from the 'bathroom uniform' that seems to have been imposed?

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There seems to have been a rule passed by the Bathroom Police that all bathrooms have to look essentially the same now. You know, big beige tiles over the floor and walls, not a scrap of wall left untiled, enormous showers, very 'hotel' finish. I don't dislike this, but am concerned it will date the bathroom and I don't want my room to look like every other bathroom. We are thinking of 5 years before selling. Any advice?

Well I'm going against the grain and saying I love the hotel bathroom look and want mine to look like that!

Everything dates or gets old and boring so things are always going to need updated at some stage.

Interesting thread.

I have a family bathroom and downstairs WC to do in out new place.

I've got a peach suite with cream and terracotta tiles at the moment.

I want something serviceable, functional and easy to clean; with the kids being the age that they are. But yeah I would like for it not to date too quickly.

Quite like the idea of doing an avant garde WC ...

I love the people saying "oh no, I dont have beige.. I have grey.." Its basically the same no? A plain colour, currently thought to be sophisticated.

I like loads of tiles myself but
I know one thing; I never want to see another metro tile.

Yes, grey is just the new beige. But if you read pinterest enough, it has an influence...

Our downstairs loo and shower room is beige porcelain tiles and yellowy beige paint. We tried to break out but in the end its the one style we both could agree somewhat on. I wanted big plain cream tiles, DH wanted black metropolitan public toilet style. We were never going to agree to extremes and we both liked the tiles we picked. Its plain and boring and simple and nice looking.

Upstairs is a riot of lilac walls, pale green patterned tiles and reused vinyl floor from my mum's old kitchen. Its a mishmash of what was already there and what was cheap and its fine. One day I will redo the bathroom, goodness knows what we will choose but it won't be dictated by fashion or not-fashion. It'll just be what we like thats reasonably cheap at the time.

Unlucky I know what you mean about the cleaning, but I always use black grout. Much more practical, and it shows the colour of the tiles far better.

I visit houses as part of my job , lots of elderly peoples homes and see lots of original 1970's (I think) bathroom suites of amazing colours with coordinating tiles. Yesterday it was a bright sea green suite...looked great!

We're still 4 fucking years on doing ours - big sand coloured porcelain tiles on the floor and a half tile for skirting. Walls are painted cream.

Boring and slightly hotel ish but I've got bright orange and green tiles to go on round the sink and bath, orange and green towels etc.

I'm looking for a lump of oak for the window sill and some orange / green 'something' for the big plain wall.

I have never installed a bathroom, as wherever we have lived has always had a perfectly nice bathroom and there has never been any need to change it.

We have lived in our house for nearly five years. I think the bathroom was probably five years old when we moved in. So, ten years old. It hasn't dated at all. I will do my best to describe it to you:

Large counter top white rectangular sink on a white gloss very wide wall mounted cabinet. The cabinet is about two feet wider than the sink. White bath with bath panel at the side and feet end, with three large light grey squares in it side by side. Large double shower, white shower tray.

Tiling goes on three walls - two of the walls to say about 4 feet high, and then the fuull height of the shoer on the other wall. Tiling is very large, very dark grey, almost slate look plain tiles, in the same pattern as a brickie would brick a house (technical terms!), with little tiles in the same colour (there is no pattern in the bathroom) going vertically in a narrow section in the centre of the shower.

Flooring is oak look amtico.

Enormous white towel rail.

Large mirrored bathroom cabinet above sink.

Geometric print grey and white roller blind.

I refurb houses for a living and never would do beige bathroom it's a horrible look no individuality and dull. I have also ripped out a few! For others who don't like them either Choose what you love and treat it as a room not purely functional

Yikes! We have an east London bathroom and I never realised! Still at least I know now to stick a large plant in there to finish the look off!!

I like the beige look tbh, I think it's much warmer than grey (which as others have said is everywhere and will date too). The whole "hate beige, we have grey," makes me laugh. To me, white tiles can look a bit municipal baths.

I'm at the mention of lots of wood and books in bathrooms. Do you have shit hot extractor fans, or keep the window permanently open?

My dad is the manager of a tiling company and people definitely are still picking beige and stone shades of tiles.

Grey is the same tbh was overdone in the last 6 or so years and I have seen a fair bit of grey ripped out and painted over White is timeless and always looks good.

Have whatever you like, its your house. Personally I don't like white tiles monochrome rooms and detest metro tiles but obviously lots of people love them. The beauty of taste and style is that there are so many options.

Anyway, the room itself should tell you what it needs. Is it small and awkward, large and cavernous, dark, light, to be used by a family, or a couple etc. I think decor goes wrong when people just impose whatever they like or think is stylish on a room without thinking what would suit the room.

Love the patchwork bathroom.

I would go white and focus on form. And then you can add pops of colour through towels, and high end accessories. It is possible to make quite a cheap bathroom look very expensive this way.

Choose what you love ultimately as its expensive and you have to look at it every day.

OP, I could have written your post. So dull, this bathroom look..

Anyway, would you consider tongue and groove? There's plenty of bathrooms with it on Pinterest and it gives another opportunity to use an additional paint colour to play with.

I like the hotel bathroom look - clean, functional, spacious and warm.

I can't bear white tiles with a white suite, even with a few coloured tiles thrown in it looks clinical and soon looks grubby IMO. I work in a clinic, I don't want to bathe in one as well.

Conversely I don't like coloured suites - my rented house has a turquoise downstairs loo and sink which is so dated!

Noddy - I've seldom seen a white bathroom done well. Unless it's tiny. Often the white tiles don't entirely match the white of the basin, loo etc. So the look ends up looking dingy.

Can you post us up some pics of your bathrooms that you've done in white.

The bathroom I'm doing is north facing and because of a big tree outside, it gets very little natural light, even though the room has a big window. That's why I'm going for highly polished limestone lookalike (it's pale cream with a warmer pale sand mineral running through it). I've gone for highly polished tile to bounce the light around. On the floor I'm having a bigger unpolished version of the same pale limestone. I think it's going to look great. I know I can spray it to death with Viykall and buff it off with an soft cloth and it will look fantastic for ages.

I was going to go for some very trendy matt cream polished concrete look tiles on the walls but when I put the tile sample in the bathroom, I realised immediately that the room was going to look dead and dingy if I used those tiles. And it's the only time I ever tried to clean a tile before returning it to the shop: it wasn't dirty, it just looked grimy.

My tiles cost me £10 a sq metre which means I have more of my budget left to spend on lovely taps and a Hansgrohe shower.

But I do agree the look is boring. But boring is good in a bathroom. I want it to be serene and clean: to be a nice place to hang out.

Grey is the new beige when it comes to bathrooms.

Fully tiled beige bathroom = 2000s.

Fully tiled grey bathroom = 2010s.

White tiles = municipal, show the dirt easily.

Victorian/retro style bathroom = timeless but impractical and uses a lot of space.

Anything else = someone will hate it or it will date easily.

There's no perfect option!

I don't really understand why people would criticise a bathroom for looking like a hotel. Hotels aim to choose designs that they think most people will like, that will have some style whilst not costing the earth, that will be durable under a lot of use, and that will be easy to keep clean. Why wouldn't you want that?

boring is good in a bathroom yep I agree. DD's bath toys add plenty of interesting colour anyway

We did beige tiles/white suite in our last house, to sell it, and made the mistake of painting the non tiled bits of the walls a lovely minty shade of green. The sheer number of people who complained that they liked the house but couldn't see themselves painting over some pale emulsion was astonishing. I did regret not making it as bland as possible after a bit.

Well we've just renovated a house (almost finished!) from top to bottom, and sorry to say, but we've put boring travertine beige tiles with the obligitory mosaic in the shower! It was DH's choice, he picked bathroom decor, I picked kitchen- kitchen is AWESOME! Orange oven, mismatched top and bottom units, with retro orange and brown accessories- it's AMAZING! I have gone for the same travertine tiles for the floor though- apologies!