Sunday, September 5, 2010

First Major Renovation - New Bathroom

My Victorian cottage is typical of most houses of that era; the ‘wet areas’ were added at a later time in an addition invariably known as a ‘lean to’. The ‘lean to’ on my cottage is approximately 7 metres by 3 metres and contains the kitchen, bathroom, laundry and loo. That’s a lot of functionality in a small area.

'Lean to' - view from kitchen
Ultimately, the plan is to remove the bathroom and laundry, expand the kitchen and turn the laundry/loo area into a rear entrance/mudroom.

The first step in this plan is creating a new bathroom from the third bedroom. Once stage one is complete, the old bathroom can be removed ready for the expansion of the kitchen.
Bathroom stripped bare
Unfortunately, we had to remove the Baltic pine lining boards. I would have loved to be able to reuse them but most couldn’t be removed without damage. But... I’m sure I’ll find a new use for them one day.
Starting to come together
As you can see, I used a timber dado to tie the bathroom back to the rest of the cottage which has panelled walls throughout. All the woodwork in the bathroom is painted with several coats of enamel to keep it waterproof. I don’t mind saying that it was a VERY smelly job. Enamel paint really gets up your nose! The painting is not quite finished but has been put to the side until summer so that every door and window can be open for ventilation.

Here’s the (mostly) finished bathroom...

The new bathroom
So, stage one is essentially complete. Stage two is about to begin; demolition of the old bathroom. Now, where's that sledge hammer...?

1 comment:

  1. Wow you are brave. We are learning alot from revamping our chest of drawers and having fun. It is a great family project.

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