I'm not an expert in transoms or steam shower design, but I'm surprised nobody has yet said why they were invented, get installed, and are used. 1/ Steam machines make steam. More and more of it. Without new steam, the experience of a steam shower can be less and less enjoyable. New steam is needed. It actually puts pressure on the walls, and in 24hour commercial steam showers this is a big thing. But, even at home, where does all the water vapor go? It doesn't all become liquid (condensation) and go into the drain. 2/ :: Plan where it will go, otherwise it will go places you don't want it to go. A transom is a safety valve putting your excess steam into the bathroom, from where the fan exhausts it. 3/ :: Otherwise steam seeps into everything. Wall-ceiling junctions. Light fixtures. Into the attic insulation. Water vapor can penetrate anything, because it has time on its side, and the world's best solvent: H2O molecules. The opposite approach is "If you only use the steam shower for a short time and not often, who cares?" Anyone want to defend that point of view? I think there is no point building something that you "really ought not to let run". Some future user might want long steam showers, or frequent steam showers. Without a transom, you are guaranteeing that your escape route for water vapor will be confused, since it's unplanned, uncoordinated and unwanted, and your result will eventually lead to problems. As far as I know. Anyone reading this thread so far would be well advised to look more into it instead of concluding that transoms are just for fun. Many homeowners don't care much about codes or practices and will allow anyone to build anything for them. After that, it may or may not work as expected, and ultimately the homeowner may or may not be satisfied. This applied to all fields of construction. My writing this out is not to say that anyone here has been intending to do the wrong thing deliberately. Hth

I have a shower with no curb -- it's designed to be a roll-in. There is a vinyl sweep on the bottom of the door, and there is absolutely no problem with water. On one side of the door we have 3" tiles (the inside the shower part) and on the other 12" tiles (the rest of the bathroom floor). You don't need a chrome strip. All it will do is get grungy. As for French doors, that's fine, if you want to spend the extra money. We have one door.

If I'm understanding your post correctly...it depends on the construction/design of the pan. If the pan can't bear the weight of the wall framed right on top of it, probably the easiest would be to build a 2x6 wall and notch out the bottom of one side of the studs to go over the curb. Example...let's say your curb is 4" wide and 3" high. Think of the stud standing vertically. You'd want the notch to be tall enough to clear the curb height, say 3-1/8" to 3-1/4". You'd want the notch to be deep enough to cover most of the curb, but not so deep that the stud is too fragile after it is notched. So for this example make the notch 2-3/4" deep, leaving 2-3/4" of the 5-1/2" width of the 2x6 uncut. A 2-3/4" deep notch will cover 2-3/4" of the 4" of curb width, leaving 1-1/4" of the curb exposed. In the drawing below, think of the "x" as the stud and the "o" as the pan. You can see how the stud is notched out to accept the pan. The "z" is the sole plate for the wall. You'll have two sole plates. One at the bottom of the wall that will sit on the bathroom floor, one at the bottom of the notch that will sit just above the top of the pan's curb. "c" is the cement board and "t" is the tile. xxxxxxct xxxxxxct xxxxxxct xxxxxxct xxxzzzct xxxoooooo xxxoooooo xxxooooooooooooooooooooooo zzzooooooooooooooooooooooo When you add the cement board and tile to the inside face of the wall, it'll build it out a bit, but a bit of the edge of the curb will remain visible. How much depends on the style of the curb, if the edge is closer to square, or if it has a generous radius, etc. If you use 6-mil poly in that wall, seal the bottom edge of it to the top of the curb. In this case, your curb is 4" thick, the notch is 2-3/4" deep, leaving 1-1/4" of curb exposed. The 1/2" of cement board, the 1/8" thickness of thinset, and the 1/4" thickness of the tile will cover another 7/8ths-inch of the curb, leaving 3/8" of the curb exposed. One other comment...if the inside edge of the curb is dead straight then all will look fine. If the inside edge of the curb waivers in and out a bit, that 3/8" of curb might go from 3/8", to 1/2", to 1/4", etc, as the curb waffles around. The more your curb waffles in and out, the more curb you need to leave exposed to compensate for the waffling. With 2x6 framing, this will be a "thick" wall. A great opportunity to use the stud bays for storage. A shower niche on the inside, or a tall "medicine cabinet" or "storage pantry" built in to the stud bays on the opposite side.

We did our shower floor-to-ceiling, and then the one shower wall that's not glass is also floor to ceiling tile. It's one wall of the toilet alcove. Then we ran the same tile (from the other side of the shower) around about a strong 1/3 of the way up the wall, to be a backsplash for the vanity, and a surround for the soaking tub. That covers MOST of the wall area. The little that's left has regular baseboard. We were going for a modern look but within a traditional cottage-y home, so this worked for us. To my eye, it looks contemporary and high end. The one monolithic wall of tile to the ceiling (with no art or anything to break it up) looks really cool :) I'll try to get some more photos up today... some progress photos can be seen on GW on other threads.