Small Bathroom Design: Some Helpful Tips

As you’re probably working with one of your home’s smallest spaces, utilising every inch is crucial. Your bathroom, whatever size, needs to be highly functional and practical. Avoiding design mistakes at the planning stage will save you unnecessary costs in labour, tiling and sanitary ware in the future. Here’s a short guide for getting the most out of your small bathroom, including help with planning, positioning and purchasing the right suite.What’s the first step?When working with a Small Bathroom area, the most important thing to consider is its quantities and dimensions. As your available space may be limited, you should draw or make a layout of your bathroom, with correct sizing (to scale!) before embarking on your small bathroom project. At this stage, it’s essential that you include in your layout any windows, internal walls, doors (including any door swinging space), existing fixtures and with allowance for adequate entry/exit space.If you’re starting from scratch, you’ll need to use the dimensions of the room to get an idea of the required sizing of your sanitary ware, and the quantity of wall and floor tiles or material you’ll need to purchase. It might be useful at this stage, as you’re working with a small bathroom space, to experiment by cutting to-scale templates of the sanitary ware and fittings and moving them around to test which variation works best. By doing this, you’ll be able to see if you can make better use of your space and what will actually fit. If you’re renovating, you will also most certainly be working to a budget. If you’re trying to keep costs at a minimum, you may want to keep the lavatory in its original position and save the expensive task of rerouting the drainage. Other significant fittings may also need to stay in position due to drainage; however, you may want to replace them.  If you desperately desire to move the lavatory, and the drainage can’t be moved, you should consider installing a macerator (Saniflo is a popular option) which will only require limited piping and is also helpful in new or loft bathrooms where there is no pre-existing plumbing in place. Where can I find products to suit a small bathroom?There are a variety of space-saving and compact small bathroom products on the market in the UK. Shires, Roca, Manhattan, April Showers, LWCC and Vitra are some major UK suppliers of products such as baths, shower baths, recessed shower enclosures, toilets and cloakroom sinks to suit a smaller bathroom. You can find these (along with their dimensions, to help with your planning) and other products to suit small bathrooms at BathroomTrade.co.uk, a reputable UK online Bathroom store. You can even choose from a broad range of small bathroom and cloakroom suites to suit your style and budget. Any other helpful tips?It’s a good idea to speak to your plumber about your planned layout before you commence work. Your plumber will be able to advise on piping, drains and water pressure. A good plumber will most likely have been inside a number of small bathrooms, like yours, and may have some useful advice for placement of sanitary ware, basins and the lavatory - if you’re looking for inspiration or a bit of help. In terms of space enhancement, simple additions like mirrors, light colours (tiles and floor), good storage and choosing wall hung sanitary ware can make your bathroom seem larger than it is. If you’re fortunate enough to get it, natural light also does wonders.A small bathroom can be an asset to your home, and if you have a well-thought plan, get some credible advice and search out quality sanitary ware, you’ll be off to a good start!