Anne Ellard, Houzz contributor and interior & kitchen designer at Kitchens by Kathie…
The bathroom is one of the busiest rooms in the house – especially in the morning when everyone is rushing around to get ready for work or school at the same time. So it makes sense then, that when designing your bathroom vanity, function and practicality is just as important as style and finishes. Here are several that caught my eye and cover all the bases.
Design skilful storage
Storage is just as important in the bathroom as it is in any other room of the house. When designing your bathroom vanity, consider everything that you need to store in there from shower gels and shampoos, to toilet rolls and cleaning products. Carefully planning practical storage will help to ensure everything has a home and things won’t need to be kept on top of the vanity.
A shaving (or medicine) cabinet with mirror doors on the wall above your vanity is an excellent way of creating clever storage. Recessing these cabinets into the wall so that the mirror doors are almost flush with the walls creates a very streamlined look with “secret” storage.
Your shaving cabinet really only needs to be deep enough to store moisturisers, shaving gels, etc, so about 150mm clear internal depth should be sufficient. Set it up with adjustable shelves so you can vary them depending on the height of the items you want to store.
As in the kitchen, drawers are a great way of creating more user-friendly storage in your bathroom. If your drawers are directly under the sink then you will need to have the drawers cut around the sink drainage pipe.
Build in permanent divisions inside drawers, or buy drawer inserts to divvy up the space to hold all the smaller bits and pieces you may want to store such as make-up, moisturisers, nail polish and even jewellery.
Incorporating open shelving into your vanity allows you to store towels within easy reach – and they look great, too – creating a spa-like feel in the bathroom.
Gain extra bench space by running your vanity benchtop over the end of the bath. The space below can be used to store your beauty products in a pretty basket or the kids’ bath toys.
A wall-mounted, or “floating” vanity, is a great way to make a small room feel much bigger. The more floor space you can see in a room the larger it will feel. Bear in mind that with this style of vanity it is preferable for your drainage pipe to go into the wall as opposed to down to the floor. If the drainage pipe does go down into the floor and can’t be changed you can still have a floating vanity of sorts – you will just need to box the pipe, creating a pedestal underneath the vanity.
Lighting is another great way to give the illusion of more space. The LED lighting under this vanity accentuates the fact the cabinets are floating and also provides a real wow factor.
If it’s not possible to have your toilet cistern built into the wall but you really want the streamlined look that it provides, maybe you can use your vanity to hide the cistern. You will not only get the look you are after you will also gain valuable bench space above the toilet which will make the space feel bigger.
Opt for a smart sink
If you are thinking about a stone vanity top, consider an undermount basin. Because these basins sit below the surface, any water that gathers on top can easily be wiped straight into the basin. And, if you wall-mount your taps, cleaning in and around the basin becomes a breeze.
Speaking of cleaning, you could consider an all-in-one vanity top and sink, like in this bathroom. This will give you a seamless finish with no lips or ridges to clean around. And because the look is so streamlined, it will help to make a small vanity appear larger.
If your bathroom or ensuite is quite narrow and you don’t have space for full-depth cabinets, opt for a semi-recessed basin. The cabinets that sit under this style of basin are much shallower than normal, saving you valuable floor space while still providing necessary storage.
Something for all the family
If you have the space, incorporating two basins into the design of your vanity is a great idea. Whether it’s a his and hers in the ensuite or a space that can be shared by two or more children in the main bathroom, it will save time (and arguments) in the mornings.
Children often struggle to reach the basin and taps of vanities when they are young. A built-in pull-out step in the kickboard, or under your vanity, will save you from having to buy, and store, a shop-bought step, and will give your children a feeling of independence if they don’t have to rely on you to help.
Bye bye dirty laundry
A clothes hamper is a great item to consider building into your bathroom vanity. It will free up floor space and will hopefully mean fewer dirty clothes for you to pick up off the floor.
If you are lucky enough to live in a two-storey home where your laundry is situated directly under your bathroom or ensuite, why not look at the idea of incorporating a laundry chute? Just pop the clothes into the chute upstairs and, voilĂ , they appear in your laundry ready for washing.
If your laundry and bathroom are in the same room, then building your washing machine and dryer in underneath the vanity bench is a good way to keep the space neat and organised. Your vanity basin can double as a laundry tub, too. Look for a ceramic basin that is deep enough to hand-wash clothes, or to fill a mop bucket easily, but still looks stylish.
The bathroom is the perfect room in the house to really let your creative side loose, so use this room to try out different colours and styles you might not ordinarily go for.
This black vanity with profiled fronts and decorative porcelain handles might not be something you would personally consider for a large kitchen space, but on a smaller scale in the bathroom its not as overwhelming.
