Gibby: The only application I might give pause to recommending a Solatube is where the dome is visible at the front elevation of the house. Our Solatubes can be seen along the sides, but with the angle of our hipped roof lines, you cannot see any vent stacks or either Solatube when you stand directly in front of the house. Now as you walk around the house, you see them (of course). We have a brown roof and they really have a low profile so they don't jump out at you. And since most bathrooms are towards the rear of the house, this shouldn't be a problem, but thought I'd mention it. I believe that the Solatube brand can only be installed by dealers or contractors, but that might be the case in Texas. Home Depot also sells a comparable product, but I don't know about the quality. We bought the 10" diameter tube with a plain opaque lens, and it gives off plenty of light. Any bigger and we'd have to wear sunglasses in our bathrooms! Here is a link that might be useful: Solatube

We have the Victoria + Albert York. It is very deep. I can't imagine it being any deeper or else it would be so hard to get in and out of. At first I really, really wanted the MTI Linda tub, was just in love with that tub plus you could get radiant heat in it along the back where you lean. I sat in it at Ferguson's and it was nice but honestly, it was sooo expensive and it's just crazy to spend $6-7K on a bathtub. I think the lowest I found it without the heat was in the mid $3K range. Still out of reach with all the other stuff to buy, too. That is what led me to the Victoria + Albert York because it looked the most like the MTI Linda. Since I have the York now I never think about the Linda tub anymore except to wonder if the wider tub would feel more roomy. The York is fairly narrow but it's still comfortable. I have the 68 1/2" size. It fits perfectly in the space we removed the deck jacuzzi tub out of just doesn't extend into the room as far, a plus. Good riddance to that thing!!! I love the freestanding tub, makes the bathroom look so much bigger and I have already used it more since May than I used the jacuzzi tub in the previous 13 years! That is a very good price, you can get the tub and the faucets for $2800? That's a good deal. I got the floor mounted faucet that is freestanding, the faucet hangs up like a telephone. Very British looking. With all the component pieces plus the drain I think we paid more like $3200. If you live in Atlanta I believe they ship from somewhere not too far south of Atlanta. The saleslady told us the lava ash that the V+A's are made of help to retain heat. I don't think I would ever have any sort of power feature on a tub again. Just something else to worry about and it's not as heavenly as it seems it would be. For me I love being able to use bath salts and bubble bath to abandon and while they say you can with the air bath I wonder if it's really ok. I never could do that with the whirlpool tub as it was a no no. Happy hunting!

The hand held is mostly for making cleaning the shower easier (or pets etc.) I don't necessarily think we'd normally have them on the sometime just was thinking it might be "fun" like a carwash haha. Do you know how much hydronic under-floor heat runs to install? I was leaning towards the mats because I think they are a few hundred and there is no way I will be able to convince my husband if they are much more. He is already not keen on the extra expense. I have never heard of guardian glass- thanks for the tip! I believe the water is hard in the town- was going to get a whole house water softener. Do you think the glass would still be necessary? The bench really was just for shaving but that being said, my husband has already needed knee surgery twice so I have a feeling it might come in use if he manages to re-injure a knee (granted I also but a full bath on the first floor as an option if he won't go upstairs). I like the idea of the bench in the vanity- do you have one? Do you use it often? I was currently focusing more on storage so I was thinking of drawers between the two sinks but maybe a lower bench/sitting area would be better. The vanity will be around 9'. I defiantly want a tall cabinet on each end (for electric toothbrushes, razors, etc. so the counters are cleared). Do you think there is adequate space for a bench? My husband won't even think twice about being by the toilet. If anything, it's probably more convenient for him since he will probably be the one spending more time there :)

Marti, looking at your shower floor problem, when you put in a one-piece shower receptor floor you don't waterproof below it because there is no water getting under the shower floor. With the system I used, and with Swanstone and other solid surface wall systems, you don't even have to waterproof behind the walls. Things interlock at the bottom so that the wall is inside the lip of the shower, and the walls either interlock above or butt so that they have no water infiltration possible or they have a single caulk joint. (Often a cove molding covers the butt and then the cove is caulked, too.) So, if you use a receptor floor and solid sheet walls, no waterproofing is done. Second, the way you set a solid pan is into a bed of wet compound of some sort. Our pan said to use tile mortar. A contractor I saw years ago on Garden Web said, "We always go one step further and set our prefab pans in structolite, which not only provides added resistance to flexing, but also gives you the feel of stepping on a solid surface." MTI says of its roll-in shower floor, "Shower base is designed to be recessed into the floor to create a flat transfer surface. Add bedding compound to fully support bottom of shower base. MTI's optional Pre-Leveled Foam Base requires no additional bedding compound or support." So, there are ways of making a solid surface or even a fiberglass shower pan very sturdy and inflexible, and these are the right ways to install them. As for the foam base, Jim did our tiled bathroom floor as a sloped shower floor using a Kerdi shower floor product that was a kit of foam pieces that you put into place using tile adhesive, then covered with Kerdi membrane, then tiled over. So, my room floor is a shower, too. That is in case the shower over-flows. So foam can be made strong enough to be under the floor of a shower. The MTI company is out of Georgia, I believe, and is worker-owned. They seem pretty innovative. I have a PDF of a shower pan that they make to be sunken into the floor like you had planned, but not so deep. But like mine, it has the entire long edge open and will not accommodate your wall closing off half or more of the front side. These pans are made more for roll-in showers. The pan I am looking at is MTI's MTSB 6036BF. I don't know if it is still made, or if it is an old product. I have the PDF sheet for it that I saved some time ago. My shower pan is from Transolid and is 37.5 x 63. Transolid also makes a 36 x 60 pan with a center drain. http://transolid.com/transolid-F6036-01 Transolid 36 x 60 It also has the entire front open, though, no wall lip. One advantage that it does have for you is that it is 3" deep, so if you put leveling compound into your poured area - or if you centered the drain on this pan onto your drain, then scribed off where your pan ends, you could pour the half inch bottom and the approximately six inches of concrete you need on each side to make a recessed spot for this pan in your shower space. You still would have to have a glass shower wall and door though. Their new construction solid surface walls are pretty cool. Made with an aluminum mesh backing, they go up onto the studs, do not require drywall like a Swanstone sheet or a plain Transolid sheet requires. And they sell a dome kit with LED lights that finishes off the top nicely. Trouble is, this shower type is only 32" deep. To get the 36 x 60, you have to have the drywall. Here is the basic shower. Transolid 36 x 60 Shower This time, I linked you to the place that sells it. There you can see the prices. The white is least expensive. Carrara and Silver Mocha are most expensive. They have a wall extension for taking this model higher on the wall to the ceiling. Wall Extension, but you have to remind them it is for the ceiling and that you need corner trim at the top. If you have questions about how to use the base, call Transolid, at the first link. Again, since there is a straight front that looks meant for a curtain or glass, I doubt you can put a wall there. You can call and ask if that is do-able, though. Have you talked to Grifform.com? They make custom shower pans. Cost a pretty penny. But, when you add up the cost for redoing the shower size to accommodate a pan that won't fit it, it could be worth it. And a custom pan may be the only way you are going to get the 6 ft length that you want. They should be able to accommodate the off-center drain too. They are in far eastern Oregon, so maybe the shipping to you would not cost as much as it did for me. I think it was like $500. Custom pans can be "flimsier" than ones they already have a mold for, because the ribs and such are set and they are just changing some minor things on the semi-custom ones. That is what I was told somewhere. You might want to ask about that. Setting it into wet mortar might make that moot, anyways. I did not look at the MTI site or at Duravit to see if they make 6 ft long pans. You may want to do that. Their pans are only an inch or two high, if I recall correctly, so I did not think it was worth checking. I could be wrong though! There are the Kohler enameled cast iron shower pans to consider, too. Bellweather is one. They are all no more than 60 inches long, I believe. They all may have drains on the end, made to fit where a bathtub was removed. I hope that you find something here helpful!