Even with 48" I have to be careful not to put my foot too close to steam head. You could do it with 42". It's just going to be a little tighter. I moved my toilet 12" so I could make mine 48". I probably could have gone a few inches longer but 48" made it simple. I did not do the work myself. It would take me forever and I would tire of it. I hired guys and did a little and butted in a lot which is much more fun for me. I hired the following contractors: - A guy to do the demo and frame the structure that supports the shower ceiling and the tub surround framing. I know his parents. He's quite good. I also hired his hispanic helper and a compadre of his to remove the old wall paper and clean out my attic while I had a dumpster. - Hired another guy that was primarily a tile guy. He also did most of the plumbing (including plumbing in the generator) with a little help from me. He and I both did minor electrical like moving boxes. He also had the usual crew of hispanics including one guy that did most of the prep and tile as well as the heated floor with my help. - I had an electrician upgrade my electrical service to 400A (I have some hungry kitchen appliances) and installed an attic sub-panel with a circuit for the generator and one for the heated floors. - Had a drywall guy to drywall the framing holding up the shower ceiling and fix the walls that were wallpapered and where we put holes for electrical work. - Painters - Cabinet maker And then there was the glass guys and granite guys. So, had to deal with 8 different contractors and about 6 or 7 different city inspectors. I designed it using Google Sketchup so everyone knew the dimensions of everything. Don't recall the specific tile but got it at Mosaic tile. I was wrong on the shower floor tiles - they are 3". HD did call it something other than Cold Spring but the guy knew what I wanted. After I made the purchase I didn't deal with HD anymore. Just the stone yard and the fabricators. A steam shower should be built very carefully to insure there is no chance of steam leaking into your walls or ceiling. There are a few different technologies and systems to do this. I went with the Schluter System. You also typically slope the ceiling so you don't get water droplets falling on you as a result of condensation. It's a bit of a pain and adds quite of bit of expense. I would do it again. The bench is not exactly comfy. It's a teak bench. Kinda hard and flat. But, it's awesome. We added backing between the studs that this thing is anchored into. It's not going anywhere. Folds very easily and is good quality. I spent a lot of time planning and dealing with contractors. Do I want to do yours? Wouldn't mind if I could earn as much as I do for a living. Unfortunately don't think that's going to happen.

We used two of the lights - one over each sink. We did another bathroom in that house (we've since moved) - that bathroom was 5'x8', and we used one of the Artemide lights. It was plenty bright enough in there! We had the lights on a dimmer, which was really nice. Yes, our contractor built out a soffit above the medicine cabinets. It wasn't my first choice for how to do it, but it ended up looking really good. I wanted to recess the cabinets, but the Ikea ones are not made to do that, and the finish details were too complicated to make it work. So we decided on the soffit, which was much simpler. I wouldn't hesitate to do it the same way again.

The shower is 5 x 5 (60 inch square). We don't have a tub in the room and that allowed for more floospace to be devoted to a very big shower, which I love. It's nice and roomy. I use the ledge for shaving legs and also propping a leg up to so I don't have to bend down to soap up the lower part of my leg and foot! The bench is out of the way and so doesn't detract from the size of the shower or make it feel cramped in any way. It could be used for sitting, but I never do that. I discovered an additional unexpected but very nice advantage of having such a large shower, which is that it doesn't seem to require as much cleaning as other smaller showers I have had in the past. Let me explain....since I shower while standing in the center of this big square "box", the soap, shampoo, and water don't really get splashed onto the walls of the shower very much, because I'm actually standing pretty far from the walls. The wall where the showerhead is and the bottom tiles that meet the shower pan all around do get a little wetter, but nothing much gets on the rest of the tiles throughout the shower. Even the shower glass doesn't get very wet. I clean the inside of the shower once every other week, but could probably go longer than that. There never seems to be any buildup of anything. This is with two adults using it on a daily basis. Best of luck with your project and please post pictures when you're done!

For what it's worth, I personally like the black iron vanity light. You could definitely match the drawer pulls/knobs to the vanity light for some bold contrast, too. Always remember that mixing metals is OK!