bathing beauty
Refresh your bathroom with creative solutions that add color, harmony, light, and art to this often-neglected space.
Glowing tone-on-tone shades of gold and apricot make this small bathroom feel larger. The antique mirror, light fixtures, and santo add character and soul.
Six-by-six-inch apricot concrete tiles installed from floor to ceiling in the shower provide height and drama. Two antique French sconces provide lighting over the vanity, and a low-voltage light on the viga illuminates the shower.
When Applewhite purchased her Santa Fe home, the bathrooms had low cabinets in stark white, small mirrors, and fluorescent lighting. Warm colors, dramatic accessories, and harmonious design choices that carry through the rest of the home result in a bathroom space that is as beautiful as it is functional.
Applewhite converted this bathroom’s original doorway into a large nicho for towel and toiletry storage. The new shower replaced a dated bathtub and features a colorful shower curtain that coordinates with the room’s striking artwork and thoughtful details.
More stories by Linda Applewhite
• Santa Fe Calling
• Inside Outdoor Rooms
The bathroom provides a place where we start the day by preparing ourselves for the world and end our day before retiring for a restful night’s sleep. These important rooms are essential to our well-being and should be both functional and nurturing at the same time. We often overlook bathrooms’ beauty in favor of functionality, but there’s no reason you can’t achieve both of these goals in your home.
The three bathrooms in the old adobe I bought in Santa Fe were usable but offered little beauty. They had sterile-looking white cabinets only 30 inches high that required low bending for access, opaque glass in the windows, harsh fluorescent lights in low-hanging soffits, and tiny mirrors. The guest bath contained an old claw-foot tub with its feet removed, embedded in a 28-inch-high tile surround that made stepping in difficult and even dangerous. The master bath held a large corner shower with a high curb that, like the elevated tub, impeded easy access.
However, all three bathrooms offered high ceilings covered in wide-plank painted pine adorned with rich, textured vigas. And each contained a window that shed lovely light.
visually expand small spaces
With my renovation, I faced the task of bringing these three important rooms up to date, providing functionality while creating beauty that is welcoming, nurturing, and consistent with the essence of my 1930s adobe. Because the rooms are small, my first challenge was making them feel larger. I implemented what I call “using the vertical.”
All three bathrooms had nine-foot ceilings, yet their height was visually diminished by the soffits, tiny mirrors, and light fixtures that caught the eye at a low level. I removed the soffit in the downstairs bathroom, restoring its ceiling height to nine feet over the vanity and exposing, to my delight, a 75-year-old viga. Hanging a much larger mirror and installing two light fixtures just below the newly exposed viga drew the eye upward. Two pieces of art, hung one above the other, further reinforced the ceiling’s height. To offer a greater sense of space, I installed a nicho where a door once stood, bringing the room depth and an area for towels and toiletries. Installing clear glass in the opaque window made the room feel brighter and larger while granting visual access to the private garden beyond. A more accessible, convenient, and compact shower replaced the dated bathtub.
In the guest bathroom, I also removed the embedded claw-foot tub and installed a large user-friendly shower whose door extends to the height of the ceiling—an approach that uses the vertical space to my advantage. I rehung the mirror and light fixtures higher than the originals. A new nicho in the shower holds soap and shampoo and imparts a sense of depth and space.
In the master bathroom, I did the opposite. I removed the large, dated corner shower and put a claw-foot tub in its place, making the room look twice as big. I repeated the nicho from the two showers on the wall adjacent to the tub. Again I “used the vertical” by designing and installing a cabinet, complete with electrical outlets, on the wall between the two sinks above the vanity. This cabinet raises the eye and provides a convenient yet hidden place to keep electrical appliances charged and ready. Raising the countertops to 34 inches in height in all three bathrooms allows more comfortable accessibility.
create harmony with cabinetry, finishes, and color
My motto “good design repeats itself” is very much at work in these bathroom makeovers. Repeating the same tone-on-tone colors not only makes the rooms feel larger but also establishes a peaceful atmosphere in which the eye moves easily throughout the space. The floors, walls, windows, cabinets, tile, and stone counters all share the same golden and apricot hues, which are lively and colorful yet offer continuity.
Duplicating shapes also provides a sense of harmony and good design. To respect the home’s age and original style, I researched historic New Mexican architectural details and selected a scallop shape to incorporate into the tile design in the wainscoting, shower surround, and nichos. The cabinetry, expertly crafted by Samora Woodworks of Santa Fe, looks more like furniture than built-in cabinets due to its distinctive aprons and pediments, the use of feet instead of a typical toe kick, and a technique called chip-carving used in making historic New Mexican furniture. Bold horizontal and vertical stripes on the window treatments and shower curtains impart a playful detail that complements the whimsical scallops.
accessorize to establish drama
The pièce de résistance in any room is the art and accessories. I agree with Gertrude Stein, who said if you are going to spend money on anything, spend it on art. For my Santa Fe home, which we named Casita Alegria, I shopped locally and found not only wonderful paintings but also many accessories that are works of art in themselves.
Keeping the overall color palette tone-on-tone, I added boldness and drama by choosing accessories made from a variety of materials and textures, such as wood, clay, metal, cloth, and even paper, always seeking to achieve harmony by repeating shapes and colors. I like to combine new and old—objects that are either old or handmade add soul and character to a room. The color black can almost always be used to add sophistication and visual impact. Combining black and white also is striking and grounds a colorful palette with an edgy yet surprisingly pleasing element.
Creating beautiful bathrooms can be a rewarding endeavor, challenging you to design spaces that work with today’s lifestyle while respecting your home’s architecture. Because these spaces are small, they require creative solutions to make them feel as large as possible while providing the functional elements necessary for comfortable living. Embellish your bathrooms with color, harmony, light, and art for beautiful rooms that will feed your senses and nurture your soul as you start and end your day.
Linda Applewhite is an architectural designer, artist, and writer who divides her time between northern New Mexico and northern California. She recently published her first design book and teaches seminars in Santa Fe and in Sonoma, California, on the topic of living in beauty.