Would you make a shower room smaller to make the room next to it bigger? Photos included.

[FuckyMcFuckFace]

Our house has a downstairs shower room in addition to the upstairs bathroom. We actually hardly use the bathroom (I hate baths, DH and DCs have them very occasionally) and prefer the shower cubicle downstairs and the fact it's a decent shower, so a heavily used room.

To get to it you go through a study. It is part of a side extension built by the previous owners, as with everything else here, it's a bit crap in terms of the layout. Shower room is probably bigger than it needs to be and study is fairly small but has an archway, a door, a boiler and a large window so very little wall space. All of these things are on different walls.

I had the idea to move the wall about 45 cm back into the shower room, which would take the wall up to the window in there and create a bigger study and move the door to the opposite side it is on so we have a corner of wall space. My theory is when the DCs are older, they may want space somewhere for another TV/games console and sofa. We currently have 1 and it's in the living room and it's a long, open living room/diner so don't have the option of a second TV/games console in there.

But, I've been on pintrest looking at storage options as I also wanted a cupboard built in the shower room for the dehumidifier and other storage for crap. There are some great ideas that we could do in a small room but I don't know how cramped we would make it if we make it smaller. A shower cubicle, toilet and sink would fit fine in a smaller room but we also dry our washing in there when we can't get it outside.

Would you just leave it as it is? My more basic idea is just move the door to the shower room so we still get the corner of wall space in the study, it would just be the same size room but a bit better in terms of what furniture we can get in there.

I've attached photos from when the house was for sale. The shower room looks the same, the study has different furniture in. The door would move to where the plant is.

I think that's an awful lot of disruption and cost, for a very small gain, tbh.
If you move the wall, it will then disrupt all your tiling and decoration in both rooms. I just don't think 45cm extra length is worth the work, until such a time as you were replacing the shower etc., anyway, when it might be more worth doing.

We did exactly this - made our en- suite bathroom 18 inches narrower. A previous owner created it by taking half of the adjacent bedroom, but it left that room only suitable for use as a nursery or study. Those 18 inches made all the difference to the bedroom, which is now perfectly usable. It wasn't cheap though but totally worth it for us, as it meant our youngest two could have their own rooms.

I may be missing the point so please forgive !y dimness but...
Wouldn't it make sense to remove the bath upstairs that noone uses, put in a shower and then convert the shower room into a downstairs loo and then you can move the wall much further for a much larger study? Maybe even big enough for a spare bedroom with ensuite loo?

Agree with see you nearer

Sort out the upstairs bathroom first

You may find that dramatically alters your use of the downstairs room(s) and then the answer may be much more obvious

We are redoing the shower room (look at it ) as it has got a lot shabbier lately. It is going to be moved around. Upstairs bathroom has already been re done. I wouldn't do away with a bath as DH does have one now and again and the DCs like one when we let them/have time. If it was just me I wouldn't care but there is also the resale factor. Most people wouldn't bother with a family house without a bath.

I'm not sure if i want the huge hassle and expense to not gain much tbh. Just wish the extension had been better thought when they did it like everything else in this house.

I think the current configuration is to allow for wheelchair access into the shower room. To future proof it, as it were.

The accessibility would be very attractive to a family with a member living with disability.

Off topic, I would move the boiler !

I think a 2nd study sitting room is appealing so worth considering but does need to be significant.What are the room sizes now?

I would look to get a separate door for the shower room, can you knock through from the hall?

A drying room is very useful so I would avoid giving that up without another solution.
Do you have an integral garage?

Out of interest why didn't you put a shower upstairs too?

I think if possible I'd make the shower room into a wet room and make it smaller. I'd move the doors so that it created the least awkward space and give as much room to the study as possible.

I don't think I can be bothered with the hassle of moving the boiler, plus we have already done the kitchen.

Not sure of room sizes, think it's about 1.91 cm wide if I remember correctly from the sizes when we bought it, can't remember the lengths, think they were quite evenly sized and definitely over 2m.

No way of making a door separately, definitely needs to go through the study. No integral garage. If we couldn't dry in shower room it would be in the study or kitchen, neither of which have doors and I'd be very reluctant to have washing around. For this reason I'll probably not make it smaller as it is very useful. I do think the door needs to move over though. Not sure how awkward this is going to be. Wheelchair access could be why it was done, the doorways do seem wide although neither of the previous occupants were in a wheelchair.

We didn't put a shower upstairs (there is a shower over bath) because I wanted to keep the built in cupboard. After seeing the hack job my crappy plumber did when making it a bit smaller I wish I hadn't bothered but that room is done now and I have no intention of doing it again any time soon. Hindsight is a wonderful thing, my friend has the same layout of house (I didn't see it before we moved here) and there is plenty of room in the upstairs bathroom for a corner bath, decent shower cubicle, toilet and sink. Didn't even think about a corner bath.