How much of bathroom walls should be tiled?

[Reallybadidea]

In the process of redoing our en suite and I'm not sure how of the room to have tiled! We're having a walk in shower and those two walls will be fully tiled of course. What I can't decide is whether to tile the remaining walls from floor to ceiling, halfway up or replaster and paint. I've never had a really lovely bathroom and I'd just like it to look amazing!

I think it’s a lot to do with personal choice and habits. My builder didn’t think it necessary to tile any of the wall to the side of sink but I know how messy my H is so wanted it tiled at the bottom. I didn’t want it tiled to ceiling though as tiles are white and I want to be able to change colour of the painted wall if I want. So I have shower area all tiled, floor to ceiling and the other walls bottom half.

My ensuite is entirely tiled, it's not huge and it would have looked quite odd to just do bits and pieces of it. It's personal choice really.

Personal choice! Sometimes a fully tiled room can look a bit Dexter murder den for sluicing down, other times it works. I do like a half-tiled wall all the way round with a pencil border if you’re doing a quite period bathroom. Our bath is in an alcove so we’ve just tiled floor to ceiling in the alcove to frame the bath (freestanding), then nothing around the basin – if it gets grubby we’ll do decorator’s varnish over the paint or gloss paint in the same colour as the walls, so it’s wipeable but not a feature the way tiles would be.

Thanks for all the comments. In terms of look, I'm (probably!) having ivory stone effect tiles, waterproof oak wood slats behind the basin and brass fittings. So not period as such, but the slats are a mid-century nod as it's an early 70s house.

I went full tiled in my bathrooms but they are both tiny so looks right. Did a darker tile on the floor. Really easy to keep clean.

We're putting an en suite in atm and have elected to tile the whole thing. In the bathroom showroom they were able to do a mockup of it and it just looked much more finished than only tiling around the shower and sink.

If it is small, I would fully tile, or wetroom panel. If larger then you can either fully tile or just tile the bits that you have to.

I tile the lot floor to ceiling. I'm just about to have my downstairs loo tiled from floor to ceiling in dark forest Green then I'll add rustic wood cupboard, artworks and plants. It's going to look amazing.

We've filed about two thirds of the way up. So high enough to protect against splashes but leaving some space for a change of colour in the future.

I’ve had fully tiled bathrooms before (and chosen them myself) but I’m more coming round to loving a partially tiled bathroom now.

I’ve gone for a fully tiled shower with tiling to approximately a foot above the sink on the wall that the sink is on, and a made to measure mirror from the top of those tiles up to the ceiling in the last en-suite I renovated. Then painted the rest.

I’ve spent a lot of time in hotel bathrooms with work and it’s influenced me.

My shower room doesn’t have any tiles.

I side the shower, it has the large panels - can’t remember what they’re called. Love them, no grout to clean.

Outside, it’s wood panelled (tongue and groove) on the lower half and plain walls above. Both painted wit good quality and appropriate paint.

I realise I’m in a minority, but love not having tiles. I don’t have any in the kitchen or the main bathroom either. It means it’s much easier to update the rooms with appropriate paint as and when you want a change.

Not en-suite but small bathroom had wall panels In shower rest plastered and painted

beauty of this you could go really bold with colour as not permanent and literally £20 In paint and you can change looked

Just had our small bathroom done. Fully tiled. I love it. Just got a darker colour on the floor and used big tiles so it doesn’t look too busy.

I'm even more undecided now 😂 Last night I was definitely going to tile the whole thing, this morning I'm thinking about leaving one wall to paint... being able to change colour in future is a good idea.

It's so much easier to clean a fully tiled bathroom and much less long term maintenance.

Our bathrooms were her when we moved in and they are fully tiled however they used a selection of diff but complimentary tiles to "zone" the shower/bath area. I hadnt really seen it before but it looks great.
there i no way i would have picked it myself.
I do think you need a very good eye to be able to do it OR just copy exactly what you have seen in a magazine / showroom.

No tiles here, just in the showers and a couple above the sink.

I don't understand why it is easier to clean to have tiles. I don't wash the walls in any room of my house, so would have zero interest in washing tiled walls.

Our ensuite shower room is fully tiled, but with a border half way up and two different matching tones below and above. The floor is darker again, so it lightens as the eye moves up. I love it 😀

The main family bathroom which is bigger is only half tiled up to the border and then painted a lighter colour above. I don't mind it as the room is bigger, but prefer the fully tiled look tbh.

I've just had the toilet half times and then I'm lacquering the mat pain above the tiles to give lovely cleanable wall areas

Fully tiled, it’s lovely, in dark tiles. Looks fantastic. Im not a fan of partial tiling. It’s only preferable if the tiles are not very nice.

Really appreciate all the comments - I still haven't made a decision haha. I might leave the wall that won't have anything attached to it and see what it looks like painted and then have that tiled later if I don't like it 🤔

We have a bath in our en-suite and it’s slightly higher than half tiled all round , the main bathroom is fully tiled .

We have around 3.5 of the walls in our main bathroom tiled. We just had it refurbed. The layout remains the same, there is a new shower cubicle and shower on the same base. We have had the tiling cleaned and regrouted where needed. We have a central border of small silver tiles. We’ve opted to have an aqua board in the shower covering the tiles as the row of small ones got very hard to clean.

I would never fully tile a bathroom, it makes it seem claustrophobic to me.

In the past I have done one bathroom half tiled (fully tiled in the shower), another with full wall in the shower and a feature wall of different tiles behind the vanity, another with full tiles around the bath/shower and then just a one row run of tiles across the wall above the sink and loo.

Only thing I’m not a huge fan of is a couple of tiles above the sink as a tiny splashback, IMO they tend to look a bit lonely and bitty, in that scenario I would choose to tile the whole wall at least to half height.

However you don’t need to tile behind the sink for splashback purposes because you have the slats, so personally I would leave the rest untiled. Gives you more scope to choose a beautiful wall colour and to change the look should you wish to later.

Another option is to take the oak slats all the way round at half height, like panelling? Could look fab.

Another option is to take the oak slats all the way round at half height, like panelling? Could look fab

Yeah, I wondered about that but we currently have painted tongue and groove but I'd like the overall look to be completely different.