Though I haven’t quite finished decorating my project room and still want to add a little fun exterior styling once the weather warms up, now that the bathroom is finished, I feel like my office renovation is complete!
I’m so grateful I had Chad to help me with this entire makeover because it would have been far less grand if I had to do it all myself. Though I would have had fun in a kind of “here’s how I renovated my office by myself on a budget”, I really have Chad to thank for turning it into the office of my dreams.
So let’s talk about the bathroom!
This bathroom was in horrible shape and now it’s pretty dreamy and feels all fresh and new and I love it!
Okay, horrible is maybe too harsh a word, I could have lived with it, but it wasn’t pretty. I could have simply painted the walls and found some stick-on tiles to go over the floor and called it a day but because Chad was willing to do the work for me, instead I got an entire bathroom makeover.
Here’s what the bathroom looked like before…
With leftover tiles, paint and even a mirror from another job Chad finished recently, I thought it would be a pretty simple and quick reno. However, the floor was totally uneven and the toilet was sinking.
When we ripped up the existing flooring we found old CARPET underneath. Yes, CARPET. And under the carpet was rotting wood. Chad had to install new subflooring and leveler before he could begin the tile.
Since we removed the sink from the random “sink room” and used it in the bathroom, he also had to redo the plumbing in both rooms as well as fix the toilet plumbing, so that all took extra time.
A few progress shots…
I actually have more videos than photos of the process but I can’t share them here as easily.
It’s really a tiny space! And it has a shower! So crazy!
Besides materials for fixing the plumbing and the flooring, the only thing we bought new was the toilet. It has an okay light fixture that I’ll eventually change the globes on, but for now, it’s good enough.
Also, if I owned this place I probably would have chosen different materials for the flooring and even a different sink, but since I don’t I thought I’d just make it work with what we already had, and I’m pretty happy with the way it turned out.
The “sink room” turned closet…
Since we already had this sink, it was easy enough to install in the bathroom and get rid of the old drooping sink that was hanging from the wall. We also pulled off the doors in this space to create open shelving in this room, painted it white and added a clothes bar and a shelf above and hung this vintage mirror as well. This closet is really only necessary because I have a ridiculous amount of clothes I’d like to sell and hopefully once they’re here, I can get on that asap!
While the bathroom makeover was a HUGE improvement from its original state, it felt a little boring to me so the other day I grabbed a pencil and started drawing line art faces on the wall… and I kind of loved it.
I always enjoy a little bathroom with a lot to say, and adding a contrasting and interesting accent wall easily does the trick! We wallpapered our powder room at home last year around this time and it created a really fun little space I just love!
Painting the faces…
I wanted to do a time-lapse video of me drawing and painting all of the faces, but when I kept putting the whole thing off I realized it was too much pressure, lol, so I just grabbed my paint and a brush and started.
Near the end, when I had about 4 faces left to paint, I set up my camera and recorded and created a reel on Instgram to show a little bit of my process, which is basically, draw it out with a pencil and paint over it with a paintbrush 🙂
After penciling on all the faces, it took a few days for me to get courageous enough to actually do it… and originally I was going to use a Sharpie marker because I thought it would be eaiser… but in the end I decided paint would be a better option so I grabbed a black acrylic paint that was leftover from my last Paintillio painting and just put the brush to the wall… and then it really CAME ALIVE!
The black paint on the light grey wall created the dramatic contrast I was really hoping for, but the faces also became more interesting and lovely once they were painted. I erased a few I didn’t like and then I was snowed in for a few days and when I returned I drew and painted on the ones seen in the Instagram video as well as a few more lower down on the wall.
I absolutely love the way it turned out, though I don’t love each and every face I created… but I’m living with the imperfections because overall I think it’s beautiful. Also, it’s really better in person, I must admit.
I also feel like I may want to add a few more faces… sometimes I think it’s just right and then sometimes I look at it and it feel lopsided and needs to be filled out a little. I can’t tell just yet, but for now, this is how I’m leaving it.
I also used a silver rub-n-buff on the mirror frame (it was originally green) to add a little more drama and interest and because the fixtures are all silver, so it worked.
Oddly enough, there’s a shower in this bathroom as well, which I am currently using for storage. I used an old curtain panel I’ve had from three houses ago and hung it as close to the ceiling to cover the space and create a higher ceiling look. The color and lines of these old curtains actually worked pretty well in the space. If you’re a long-time follower, you’ll know that I LOVE being able to use what I already have to create something special. I would really rather repurpose something than buy new, in most cases. Though I do draw the line with some things… like the toilet 😉
Yes, I had a really hard time editing these photos down to just a few, so there are way too many that all look kind of the same but are actually different.
The one thing I forgot was a towel holder! I’ll probably just hang a little hook by the light switches to hold a hand towel since the space is too small… and really, I’m the only one in here for the most part 🙂
If you want to create this kind of wall for yourself, check out my face line art inspiration post here. I don’t really have too many tips other than find some line art faces you really like, grab a pencil (that’s easily erasable) and start drawing… then erase what you don’t like and continue drawing until you like the results. Then grab your paint and brush (or a wall paint marker) and just go over all the pencil lines. Once it dries, erase any pencil lines that might still be showing and that’s it!
In true line art, you would keep your pencil or paint brush on the paper the entire time without lifting it but I completely broke the rules just to get “the look” of line art on my wall, and I think that’s totally okay 🙂
It has an old ceiling heater that originally didn’t work, but Chad fixed it! He also had just removed one from a job he was doing so he used the spare parts on this one to make it work! I swear he can fix anything!
Happy Monday LOVECATS!
It’s snowing AGAAAAAIIIN HERE. UGH. I’m so ready for summer I can barely stand it!
* Find all my Mountain Office Renovation Posts here
