Personally prefer the first option, as I love free-standing tub.

As for towels, you may design the shower enclosure hooks to be towel bars,

or get a removable towel holder which is with wheels.

Just remember with a free standing tub you need to be able to clean all the way around it. A small bath and a free standing tub may be not good for that.

Do you use a tub frequently? I do not and we have a lovely deep tub in the hall bath already so we chose a larger shower with a bench and a cushioned bench outside the shower inplace of a freestanding rarely use tub.

@raimondi Thank you - I do use the tub everyday so we would like to keep it, but I agree a better shower would be the best fit for this small space.

@millworkman Yes! That's exactly what I am concerned about - a 32 x 60" freestanding tub in a 40 x 60" space isn't going to leave much room to get around it.

@Aquaiaw Plumbing Thank you, but I am not sure what you mean by enclosure hooks? I am open to either hooks or bars. We have one towel hook now outside the shower, but when we expand the shower depth to go to the door, there will no longer be room.

@Cheryle Podgorski Something like the bar in following photo:

Ha! It sure does seem that men only shower.

Well, as it was it was explained to me long ago, it's because they are just too tall to fit in the bathtub.

All the women in my family take baths.

It's also cultural.

Men from certain cultures take baths after they have showered to get clean.

Although it is more difficult as one gets older to bathe, so you have to be mindful of that-

free standing baths are much more difficult to get into, and you want to place the taps such that you don't have to stretch clear across the tub to draw your bath.

You also may want to consider a grab bar to help yourself up.

In your photo the shower is very small.

is there a way to attractively combine the tub and a showerhead?

There are some very nice combos I've seen.

That will save you space and give you room for your towels.

I am female and have tried to enjoy baths because we are lead to believe we should love them but i skeeve the idea of sitting in water that even with a preshower leaves a ring around a tub. lol

If you have hard water your soap or bath bomb or even just your water , or your water plus your exfoliated skin cells will leave that ring.

You can get a an OXO extendable tub and tile scrubber.

Or, the modern version and let electrical power do the work and get an extendable cordless chargeable multihead spin scrubber.

Amazon sells so many versions.

First fill the tub with hot water and throw in Oxi-Clean and let that sit there .

Then use the power scrubber.

You might change your soap.

I have found that liquid (glycerine based) soaps leave less "soap scum" than bar soaps.

Or take your showers.

The power scrubber works very nicely on tile, too.

Just be careful to not go overboard on the grout.

Remember when you were learning to brush your teeth and your mom said "You are not scrubbing the floor!"