A Moody Bathroom

FINALLY. It’s time for some new house talk! Yes, we’ve still got a Moving Vlog to show you eventually, but that can wait because I can’t hold back anymore. I’ve been dying to show you some of what we’ve been up to in terms of making the new house into our own (paint! new furniture! hanging stuff!) and today we’re going to get the ball rolling with a good ‘ole fashioned moodboard. I’ve done these before (just click on the images below to read those specific posts) and the more I do them, the more I look forward to doing more…

It’s like designing a room with no strings attached. Shopping with no budget. Making choices without the dread of having to re-paint if the color is all wrong. Going out on a limb and pushing against our comfort zone without the worry of hating it in the end. The ultimate dreaming if you will.

I even did one for our downstairs bathroom in the last house and we were really excited to put it into practice… but then we moved and had to shift gears. 🙂

SO, as we thought about what we want each room to look like in the new house, there has been a mix of ways we’ve answered that question. For some spaces, we just jumped right in and hoped for the best. For example, the main living areas that are all connected all got a fresh coat of white paint and that happened even before we moved in. In fact, I chose that color in the span of about 20 minutes just by holding a slew of paint swatches up against the wall and eliminating choices one by one. That was pretty nerve wracking because we usually like to pick a few top choices, paint some sample swatches, and scrutinize which is our favorite over the period of a week or so. In this case, I was on my own in the house and had a time constraint so I just did the best I could and we crossed our fingers that it would turn out okay. In the end, the walls look great!

For other spaces, we knew a general direction we wanted to go in, but not necessarily the grand plan. In our Master Bedroom, we knew we wanted to go out on a limb and try a darker, moodier color so we grabbed a few test pots and were able to make a quick decision. That room has been painted since the first few weeks we lived here. More on that to come. 🙂

The bathrooms, though… now these are a different story. Let me give you a bit of context. The bathrooms of this house were not in great shape when we moved in. They both needed deep cleaning, repairs, new paint, and just all around a little TLC. Here’s what the hall bathroom looked like when we first walked through the house:

And after it was all cleaned out, here’s where it’s been for the last four-ish months:

Needless to say, the bathrooms have been a real source of stress for me these past few months because between those and the kitchen, if they don’t feel like your own, it’s really hard to feel comfortable in your home. Being so sick throughout the pregnancy in bathrooms that felt foreign, dirty, and unfamiliar was tough. I couldn’t wait to tackle them and when we finally got through the majority of the sickness portion, they were our first priority. We have done major work in both spaces, but for the next few weeks, I’m going to focus on bringing you up to speed on the hall bathroom. After all, it’s the closest to being completed and I just can’t wait to have a room in our house that feels finished and totally our own. So, without further ado… here is the grand plan for the Hall Bathroom renovation!

1. Paint– After many paint swatches and a lot of back and forth, we landed on “Limelight” by Behr. It’s a good color because it definitely has some blue tones to it (hello, comfort zone), but also reads green-ish and gray in certain lights. Our hall bathroom gets plenty of natural light, thanks to the skylight in the ceiling, and we have found that the wall color looks great in there! As for the trim and door, we’ll be painting them both a bright white to clean things up and make it feel fresh and new.
2. Shower Curtain– We’re going with plain white because there is just something about white linens in a guest bathroom (which is essentially what this is) that feels clean and welcoming. Maybe it’s just me, but white towels are becoming some of my favorite house accessories. 🙂
3. Mirror– I wanted to try my hand at a whitewashed mirror to play off the wood grain/natural look of the room, but also incorporate that white color that weaves its way throughout the space. This was a super easy DIY that turned out pretty neat… can’t wait to show you!
4. Lighting– We’re going for Oil Rubbed Bronze accents in this room to contrast against the blue/green paint and white accents. This particular lighting fixture caught my eye because of those charming glass globes. We found our own version at a local thrift store and gave it a face lift, but after seeing this picture, I’m definitely thinking of changing out the white globes it came with for a set of clear glass!
5. Hardware– Again, ORB everything… I think it’s going to pop and we can’t wait to see it all put together.
6. Shelves– Ahh, the shelves. I have been dying to have shelves in the bathroom ever since we had a house with bathrooms. In the last house, both of our bathrooms had medicine cabinets over the toilets and while we used the upstairs one, we never even touched the downstairs. I always wondered if we could get the same amount of function out of a set of shelves as we could a medicine cabinet because the shelves would undoubtedly add some “pretty” to the room. I like the look of the natural wood against the black hardware… it really ties the whole style of the space together.
7. Greenery– I am on a live plant mission with this house. Our last house had very little natural light, which made it a challenge to keep any living greenery alive for a length of time. This house has plenty of windows and I want to fill it with all of the green things. 🙂 Especially against the blue paint and white accents, I think that an abundance of leafy greens in here will be a beautiful addition.
8. Art– Gotta have something artsy and I love how the gold lettering brings a little bling into the picture!

And that’s it… the big picture for our hall bathroom! To be honest, this room has already come a long way and most of these elements have been put into effect. Now, we get to do the fun part: add the finishing touches and then show you everything! Stay tuned!