New bathroom - top tips

[DonkeyHohtay]

Planning to rip out our very tired family bathroom and replace everything. At the moment it's your basic square room, loo opposite the door, sink next to it and bath against the wall to the left with a shower over. It's currently tiled floor to ceiling with yukky green tiles, they are all going. Ceiling is papered in woodchip, that's coming down too. So it really is a blank canvas.

With one eye on the cost we've decided to keep the configuration of the room the same as moving stuff about involves a lot more plumbing and a lot more expense - I really don't want to get into moving the soil pipe. So far all we've decided is that we want a P or L shaped bath with more room for showering and a vanity unit rather than a pedestal sink for storage. Also quite fancy wallboard rather than tiles - we have that in our other shower room and it's great.

Any more bathroom top tips? I want something which is modern and up to date. Don't mind a bit of colour. Want to avoid something so trendy that it's going to be dated again in another 5 years.

Wall hung toilets and vanity units are easier to clean under and seeing more floor can make the space feel bigger.
I'm desperate for a clawfoot bath (Edwardian house) but apparently they are a pig to clean under / behind which is putting me off.
Humidistat extractor fan rather than a set timer.
Shaver/ electric toothbrush plug sockets hidden inside a cupboard (that is tall enough for said toothbrush to stand up and charge in!)
If you plan on keeping cleaning products / toiletries in a cupboard / drawer, check the height of your usual stuff (very frustrating when it is just too tall to fit).
Pinterest and Instagram are great for inspiration.

We had our bathroom and ensuite done earlier this year. Second getting wall hung toilet and vanity unit and arranging so you get totally hidden pipes.

We have a deep one drawer vanity in the bathroom and a 2 drawer in the en-suite, two drawer is much better for toiletries (we keep cleaning stuff outside bathroom). We found moving the toilet position to another wall was a lot easier than we thought and the price difference in the whole job negligible. I would avoid any plumber that isn't keen to move the soil pipe or can't give you hidden (not boxed in) pipes (unless really awkward). We had plumbers saying it wasn't possible and everything needs to stay where it was. Then this guy came along and just said yep I'll move the soil pipe and I can put your sink pipes in your wall cavity, and move your towel rail along the wall, no problem. His quote was actually cheaper than the others.

If you don't know a plumber or have a personal recommendation ask tile showrooms/bathroom showrooms for recommendations. Be prepared to wait months for someone to fit you in their schedule, good plumbers are busy.

If you have the shower over the bath there are also keyhole baths which give you more flexibility with what you can do with bath sides (we wanted to tile ours). We got one that was slightly wider than standard and it is great for a good long soak.

Replacing a radiator with a towel rails is great, make sure they have enough (and not too much!) BTU to heat the room.

Shaver socket in mirror for charging toothbrushes and shavers.

Visit showrooms that have wetwall full rooms in display or friends with bathrooms done. We really liked the practicality idea of boards and got loads of samples in, but good looking ones which are usually acrylic rather than plastic expensive, and they do have a certain caravan look. We did go for the ceiling panels with spots which we were unsure of with tiles, but look good fitted.

If you go for tiles, coloured grout makes a huge difference to the look of the room.

Flooring is another huge consideration, I don't like hard cold tile floors so we went for vinyl click flooring and not keen on it down/walking on it.