This is a diagram, to scale, of our plan. I'm wondering whether we really have room for a freestanding shower. It would solve a big problem, the window over the tub.

This will be a gut renovation, with all new fixtures. We plan to put the new tub (probably 5' x 36-40") in the same place as the existing tub, perhaps with drain and faucets at the same end (although we might move them to the other end, near the wall). We're planning on a drop-in tub in a deck with beadboard on the sides and tile on the top. The toilet will be moved to the adjacent wall. The jog-in at the corner is for a pipe that comes up from the basement, I believe. I know it can't be moved. I was thinking that the shower should go there, but my husband doesn't want the jog-in in the shower, and he likes the toilet to be somewhat hidden. The shower outline is from the computer program he used. We would probably have frameless glass on the front side and the angled side, and the remaining two walls would probably be half-walls with glass above. The shower would be custom built, tiled probably including the ceiling. The single vanity, 48-50' wide, would go where the closet is now. Next to that, there is now a radiator under the large window which we would remove and replace with base cabinets or drawers. We would have a counter all along that wall, with the vanity (center cabinet with banks of drawers on either side) 21" deep and the adjoining base cabinets or drawers (where radiator is now) 18" deep, to clear door molding. We would replace the existing two radiators (by the door and by the toilet) with a single smaller unit, semi-recessed into the wall, probably between the bath and toilet.

I've been looking for vanities. These two photos, from THS threads, are the style I would like to use:

mojua's vanity:

mlk58's vanity:

The only thing is that we would like to have two matching "towers" above the counter, on either side of the sink/central mirror, that would be only about 12" wide and only extend out about 12" . Mlk58 posted the manufacturer of her vanity, and I found just the right vanity and base drawers, but they don't seem to have the towers I need. This is the idea (I'm sorry - I found this photo on THS just yesterday, but couldn't find the thread again today, so I don't know who it belongs to):

I'm wondering whether the shower will be too much. The plan looks spacious on the drawing, but when I walk into the actual room, it seems much smaller. We could leave the shower/bath combination, leaving part of the existing wall where the plumbing is now, but there are two problems. We would have to somehow seal the window, and my husband hates shower curtains.

I'm also wondering about our plan to have plumbing/radiator on all those outside walls. We are in NY with cold winters. We will be thorougly insulating this space, but I still don't know if this is a good idea.

All thoughts and suggestions welcome!

A couple of thoughts -

I agree w/hubby re: concealing the toilet, if possible.

I don't think I'm crazy about the angled shower, maybe because it isn't actually IN a corner, it looks odd just floating like that. And when the bathroom door is open the view of the front of the shower is partially obstructed. Maybe I'm weird but when it's just be and DH I don't shut the bathroom door. ;-) Also, I don't like having to close one door to open another. I'd probably build out a wall so the door swung flush, then put a custom shower with the door facing out. Not sure how big of a shower that gets you, though. Probably not big enough. And maybe there isn't clearance for the door because of the tub?

We just ordered our kitchen cabinets from Thomasville at HD and they have a bathroom line, maybe see if they could do your towers.

It might be a bit tight, like you said. Maybe you should (if possible) tape the dimensions on the floor to see what the actual walking room would be. If you did a clawfoot tub, it wouldn't take up as much room.

But if it were MY bathroom: ;-)

I know hubby hates shower curtains, but if you could persuade him to lose the shower, you could have a very retro looking L-shaped curtain rod. (which require TWO shower curtains...don't tell hubby!) Some of our close friends have that, a drop in with wainscoting around the base - the subway tile in the shower ends at a beefy picture rail, which goes around the room - it's gorgeous. And very vintage looking. And you could add a storage closet (or one of those cool vintage storage units from RH or the like) where the shower is.

Have you considered doing radiant heat in that room to get rid of the radiator?

Have you considered ghosting or removing the window where the tub is? (assuming it's on the side or back of the house. We had to ghost a window b/c of our kitchen reno, will hide it with a trellis.) If this isn't possible, it's not the end of the world. We had a window in our shower in our previous place (boston condo) and were stuck with it.

If yo

kpaquette, Thank you for the suggestions. We just had friends over, and they thought we should reverse the locations of the shower and the toilet (putting the shower in the corner). We are not wedded to the shape in the diagrem, that was just a drop-in available in the program my husband used. We are thinking now of having a roughly 3' x 3' shower in the corner where the toilet is shown, with the toilet next to the door facing the tub, and probably a partial wall extending into the room a bit to block the view of the toilet from the door. We don't think there will be room for the tub with deck, so we're now looking at freestanding soaker tubs, but so far the prices are horrifying. We are also thinking of not changing the entry door swing (so it will be swinging back against the current radiator, the way it is now, opposite to what is in the diagram).

My husband is adamant about shower curtains, both because they block light and because they tend to collect mold. I would prefer to have it and have a more open room, but I don't know whether I can persuade him.

I have thought of radiant heat, but I am under the impression that it is very expensive, and hard to repair if something breaks. I think we should have enough wall space for a much smaller recessed radiator.

I'm not sure what you mean by "ghosting" - blocking the window on the inside and leaving it on the outside? We could do that, I guess, it doesn't much matter what this looks like from the outside, it's up so high. But we would lose light in the bathroom.

I think that the clearance between the shower and the tub is too narrow and the shower is too small. Can you move the door over so that it opens against the window/wall? Then move the sink next to the toilet, and put a round shower where the sink is now.

You're probably right about the clearance, suero. When I go into the room it looks much smaller than it does on the plan. The door now opens against the window/wall - we were thinking of changing the swing when we did the plan. Or do you mean move the door itself to make more room on the toilet wall? What do you mean by a round shower? I haven't heard of that. If we put a sink next to the toilet, it might have to be a pedestal, leaving us no storage room at all.

Ghosting is filling in the window - inside and out. I live in a historic district and they only allow ghosting - meaning I have to leave the original exterior window moldings so you can see where the window used to be, but filled in with matching siding. If you don't have such rules, and depending on your siding material, you could fill it in completely as if it were never there. here is my ghosted window. We'll be adding a trellis to hide it when all the landscaping goes in later this spring.

clawfoots are crazy expensive. You can check salvage yards, there is one near me that sells already restored antiques for around 1k - still pricey but less than new. Or you can do what our best friends did and buy it from RH when they are having their annual 20% off bath sale.

I don't know how much you are do-it-yourselfers, but if you have a basement under your bathroom radiant heat isn't hard to install yourself - we almost did it at our house but opted for a different system. Not that I've done it, of course, but have family members who have and they say it's not difficult.

You could easily have a knee-wall hiding the toilet, just remember to allot space for it, I think it's something like 6". I wasn't sure you'd have room for it, it's hard to tell. You don't want the toilet so close to the shower that the door is banging into it.

Maybe tell hubby about the new mold resistant shower curtain liners - I had them in both bathrooms in my last house and they work really well. ;-) Honestly I'm not sure you're going to have room for both - so one might have to go. Have a bigger shower and no tub or a tub with a curtain. If it's the only tub in your house, or is a bathroom that kids would use to bathe, it will hurt your resale to get rid of it.

If you switch the door so that it opens to the right as you enter the room, and move it along the wall so that it opens against the window, you'll have enough room along the toilet wall to fit a vanity of the same size as the one you show in your plan.

Here is a link that might be useful: round showers

Thanks for the explanation of ghosting, suero - your house is lovely! We are not in an historic district, and our house has clapboard siding, so it's not that big a deal to fill in a gap. The only issue is money. I will have to figure out whether changing windows would be more expensive than buying one of those horribly expensive freestanding tubs!

We are not DIYers - neither of us has any skills. The room below is a mudroom/powderroom, and it will be renovated at the same time. So the ceiling will be open (it's half-open at the moment - leaking from the shower in the upstairs bath made it collapse!

I am happy to know about the mold-resistant shower curtains. Maybe that will persuade my husband.

You are probably right that we don't have room for both a shower and a tub. We can't get rid of the tub - we already did that in the other, smaller, full bath in the house. So this is the only tub we will have. We need a shower, too, because everyone in the house (4 of us) mostly takes showers. I am going to keep trying to find a way to have both, but I may end up having to do the tub/shower combo.

My latest idea is remove the two small windows on the back wall, and put a large window over the bath. There are spectacular views out that way, and no privacy concerns. Then we could block out the rest of the wall, and put the shower along it, maybe in the corner where the vanity is now. Then we would have to put the toilet and sink both against the wall where the toilet is now. This would leave us with a pedestal sink instead of a vanity, unless I took your suggestion of moving the door all the way to the end of that wall. I'm not sure that would work from the other side - I'll take a look when I go upstairs. Without the vanity, we are without storage and we are used to having the large closet that is there now.

And to think that I've thought all these years that we would have a large space to renovate once we got to this bath!

Thank you so much for all the suggestions. I will have to have my husband draw a few more plans.

We took our window out to avoid any leaking problems. A solar tube added natural light. The shower curtain is mildew and water resistant from the Hotel collection from Bed Bath and Beyond. That's all we use and love it.

Thanks, sjt2900. I am very reluctant to have the window in the shower. We now have to cover that wall with a shower curtain in order to avoid leaking. Very ugly, and mildew grows between it and the wall.

I have two new plans in mind, neither of which involves a window in the shower. Once my husband draws them for me, I'll post them. If neither of them work, or if they turn out to be too expensive (one involves removing two windows and replacing the third with a much larger one), then we will have to go back to the shower/tub combo, with mold-resistant curtain.

My husband and I have gone through several more plans, and this is the one we are now thinking is best:

I would really appreciate comments on this. The "low or high cabinet" behind the door will be either a low cabinet under the existing window, or a floor-to-ceiling cabinet with the window eliminated. The existing window in the shower location will be eliminated, and the shower will be either the shape shown, with perhaps a low cabinet built into the space between the shower and tub, or rectangular. We will use as much frameless glass as possible. The tub will be a drop-in, 5' or 5'6" long, 32" wide at most, and deep, I hope. It will be in a deck/frame. The width of the deck around the tub will have to be minimal. We will replace the existing small window over the tub with a much larger one. The toilet and pedestal sink will be as shown. We will replace the two existing huge cast iron radiators with a smaller semi-recessed unit one the wall between the tub and the toilet. We may consider adding a small window to this wall if we decide to lose the one behind the door.

The contractor suggested reversing the locations of the tub and shower, so that the tub is in view looking into the room. I think that this would be better, but the views from the window would be better with the tub as shown. I took a few photos out of the existing window shown on diagram as "to be sealed" angling off to the right and left. My thought is that if you are standing in the center of the room looking out the window, if it were to be placed where the shower is shown (that is, reversing tub and shower on diagram) then this is what you would see:

With the bath as shown in the diagram, this is what you would see:

In the foreground of these photos is a horribly overgrown bush which is going to be removed soon.

Any comments, suggestions, or advice you have to offer would be greatly appreciated!

I haven't read all the comments so perhaps this isn't possible, but from the original plan it looks to me as though you could flip the wc and the shower. Put in a larger raclangular shower, with a part sold wall and glass door, then the wc goes next to the solid shower wall.

Does that make sense.

I definately think you have the space for both tub and shower, my bath is smaller than yours and I'm putting in both.

Your second plan looks much better! I'm sorry if I missed something, but why do you have a gap between the tub and the shower? The shower can but up against the bathtub with just a pony wall between them. I think that it would look better and get you a bigger shower. Good luck! I love looking at floor plans...

Steady on! That 30" sink has the makings of a disaster. This is the master bath. Your stuff and his stuff that you both use with the sink and mirror will have to fit in the (small)medicine cabinet and that (very small)vanity. Try looking at the toilet/shower set up on the thread a couple above this one called "Turning 1 full bath into 2" by edmakeover. Then, looking at your original design, imagine swapping your toilet and shower. Move the shower toward the tub until it clears the bumpout and then over to the wall. Imagine filling in beside the bumpout to the end of the shower. Plenty of room between the shower and the tub since it's a neoangle. Plenty of room for the toilet and it is hidden by the door from the hall. In addition, you could center your vanity on the wall you have it on, in a bump out, so that the cabinets run the length of the wall, but are recessed on each side to clear the window and the door. Then you could put towers in both corners. Radiator between the windows.

Thank you for all the suggestions!

fondantfancy, We did consider switching the shower and toilet on the first plan, and even drew it, but when I showed the three plans to the contractor, he nixed that one. The spaces are much tighter than it seems from the drawings. Although the dimensions are to scale, the tub is just an icon my husband dropped in, and the real one will be a bit larger. We drew a rectangular shower in that position, but it has to go almost to the tub, making a kind of barrier along much of the tub side. I could make it glass there, but still. We have pretty much converged on the later plan now (shower and tub both against outside wall).

shannonaz, we saw two possibilities for the shower. One is a rectagular shower butted against the tub/deck (is a "pony wall" a half wall with glass above?) and the same width. The other is the one shown here, with the shower cut off at an angle. The gap between them would be filled with a 12"-18" wide low cabinet for storage. If we leave the large window behind the door, then we don't have much storage in the room.

tzmryg, This is not our master bath - we do not have a master bath, much to my dismay. We have two hall baths, all shared by my husband and myself and two sons. At the moment, the bath you see here is emptied out in preparation for gutting, and we are all using the other, very small hall bath. Here are photos from an earlier thread, posted when we were renovating that one:

http://ths.gardenweb.com/forums/load/bath/msg0917504220483.html

I did look at the thread on turning one bath into two, and I was astounded at how well they turned out. I think that there were no windows in that space, which probably helped with space arrangement. I see your point about using the entire wall for the vanity/cabinets (we would have to remove the large window). But one reason for getting away from the plan with a vanity is cost - the cost of a large vanity is probably about the same as the cost of sealing the two windows and greatly enlarging the one over the bathtub. I think that the large window would add more to the room. What do you mean by "towers" - tall cabinets? If we stick with the second plan, we have the option of putting a floor-to-ceiling cabinet in the space behind the door, if we remove the window that is there now. If we don't remove the window, then we can us a low cabinet or bank of drawers.

Good luck with this project! I'm sure it will be beautiful when done.

I, too, prefer the 2nd plan. I also like the idea of the shower butting up to the tub, with the glass going down to the tub deck.

I wonder how you feel about pocket doors. We just installed one in our new bathroom, and eliminating the swing issue was an enormous help to the design. A few possible issues: if this is a hall bath, that might (?) be less desirable to you. I will say that ours is in a master suite, so we may not close the door as often as we would if it opened directly to the hall. This is relevant because personally I think pocket doors aren't as nice to open/close as regular doors, although it isn't sooo difficult, of course! The other possible issue is that I'm not sure your wall is thick enough to hold both a pocket door and a recessed medicine cabinet. Unless it could slide to the right? You might even be able to move the door opening to the right further, gaining more space for a wider vanity (eliminating the cabinet you have in the bottom right corner now).

Just some thoughts...good luck!

Thanks for the suggestions, tulipscarolan. I am leaning toward the rectangular shower adjacent to the tub, glass down to the deck, as you suggest. The major or only window in the room will be over the tub, so I want light transmission.

I think pocket doors are a great idea, but my contractor hates them - he says that they never work properly. In any case, I don't think we could use one here. For one thing, all the doors off the hallway look the same, and it would be strange to have one odd one. If we were to do it, we would probably have to increase the wall thickness (maybe moving the wall to the level of the corner "box" for the big pipe) if we are to have a recessed cabinet. I would like to move the door - and someone else suggested it - but it is not possible. The bathroom door moldings go right into the corner of the hallway. This bathroom is in an extension off the back of the house (3 outside walls) and the extension laps over the two adjacent bedrooms a bit. So, although there is something like 18" from the door to the wall inside the bathroom, there is only 4" on the hall side. I wish I could get more room for a vanity.

Okay, one last thought. I know you said you said you can't move the door, but I was referring to moving it to the right. Can you move it to the left 9 inches or a foot? Then maybe you can put the toilet in the bottom right corner (where you show a cabinet), and have a large vanity on the left. It is also nice then to have the door swing open so that it hides the toilet. I don't know how much space you need for the toilet, but I'm guessing it is more than the 1'6" you have there now. But you don't need a ton of space, because when in use, the door will be shut, providing lots of open space. Just a thought; I know that moving all of this plumbing is expensive, too. good luck.

That actually is a great idea! Our building code dictates that the toilet space be at least 30" wide, but I'm sure it's fine if a door swings open into that width. The toilet I will probably use, the Toto Promenade, is only 18" wide, so that's fine. I think this might work as far as the bathroom goes. The biggest drawback would be visually, from the other side. This bathroom door is on the wall at the head of our front stairway. It is on one side of the wall, facing the upstairs hallway half of the space (the other half being the stairway half of the space). Looking up from the front door/entry hall, you now see mostly a blank wall, with the bathroom door off to the right. Moving the door would bring it out of alignment with the hallway and more into the stairway half. I will have to think about how this would look, and have my husband draw the bathroom in that configuration. It certainly has possibilities - thanks!