Instead of ordering swatches, suggest heading to the paint store and bring home lots of chips in various undertones. Then choose a few, but purchase test pots instead. This article is very comprehensive.

https://knockoffdecor.com/benjamin-moore-white/

Consider new accessories, as they will have a big influence in making the tiles and overall bathroom feel well connected and updated.

PAPER!!!!! To the ugly rescue

Go BIG EMBRACE or stay home and GUT it.

It appears you have quite a mix. I see tiny glass tile peaking out of the shower curtain. Is this a primary bathroom or a more private room with in a bedroom? White paint was my initial vote also. Paper in a bathroom with a shower that's used regularly is to add frustration to the mix. All the steam and moisture in a bathroom is antithetical to wall paper. Bathrooms were where the decorative painting of the 80s shone brightest for this very reason.

^^^

You could paper it ten times for the price of a gut.

Nobody wants it in five years.......with or without paper. Paper makes it bearable for FIVE years.

Not sure I would bother with a vanity change, unless a gut.

i agree on the wallpaper and then i’d leave the vanity and just polish up the details: a nicely done simple mirror, custom shower curtain (Etsy has tons) hung from the ceiling, gorgeous Turkish towels etc..

I had similar tile in a bath in my previous house. We painted the walls BM Pale Almond. If this has the correct undertone for your tile you could always cut the tint in half to make it lighter if that would be closer to what you're hoping for.

It looks like the shower tile goes up only partway to the ceiling. If that's the case, you might be able to use a vinyl peel and stick wallpaper, but be prepared to replace it if it comes off in the shower area. Since you'd not be doing this yourself, the labor cost is likely to far exceed the peel and stick wallpaper cost. Some peel and stick wallpaper is good quality, some is thin, wrinkly, and easily ripped so best to choose a busy pattern that will not show imperfections.

If you choose paint for this five-year bathroom, the actual shade is not required to be the one and only perfect match. There are many good choices. I'd start with using your BM deck to sort of match the grout color, then find some related off whites.

Scalamandre's zebra pattern is available in peel and stick:

https://www.wallpops.com/scalamandre-self-adhesive-wallpaper#/noFilterApplied

Bold Zebra Bathroom · More Info

@Maureen - I agree your accessories make a huge difference and look lovely. Above the toilet do I put a piece of art for a simple and more open look, or two shelves with a few accessories, which will provide a bit of practical storage but make the room feel cluttered? There is zero storage in here now, but I plan on hanging a surface mount medicine cabinet, which will be a big improvement.

Unfortunately, there's no room on the floor for a wastebasket, a small rug will take up the entire floor and not clear the door height, there's hardly room for a towel bar, and only counterspace for one soap pump.

@arcy_gw This apartment has two hallway baths: A powder room at the kitchen end of the apartment, and this small full bath in the hallway near the two bedrooms. You are right, there is bad 90s mosaic tile in the shower that I am ignoring.

@JAN MOYER and @Diana Bier Interiors, LLC - Nice paper choices, but this bathroom has terrible humidity issues, so no wallpaper.

(I have thoroughly explored the humidity issue on another thread and in consultation with my dad who is a commercial HVAC engineer and has worked on hundreds of old buildings. This is an 85 year old building with a passive vent, and per my request the building installed all new roof fans to increase the draw. This is as good as it gets and still is not good. Somethings in old condo buildings with small reserves are not solvable.)

These 2-bedroom units go for $275k - $300k often to grad students, medical residents, or middle income retirees. It will never be worth the cost and hassle of a gut.

@freedomplace1 - I'm going to look at BM Kitten Whiskers, which is said to be a close match to skimming stone. @kandrewspa I'll check out pale almond too.

@Kendrah

I suggest you find a white that coordinates with your the grout and bathroom fixtures now that I now they are white so it's difficult for me to suggest a specific colour, you have to bring in some sample.

It’s hard to get a sense of the amount of available space. Since you know you’ll be adding a medicine cabinet, get that installed and then access.

Since you need storage, maybe something like this would be a good choice.

I'd be tempted to install two 36" wide medicine cabinets for a smooth run of mirrors from wall to shower curtain. And paint the walls whatever off white looks good. There's nothing like a big-enough medicine cabinet for storage! Maybe add narrow glass shelves just over the sink if you need some space to keep things out. A wall mounted toothbrush holder next to a hand towel hook may work fine on the perpendicular wall.

It sounds odd, but I think you want warm whites with a pinkish undertone instead of yellow -- it will play down the pinkishness of the tile by blending with it rather than contrasting. It's possible that just the right warm gray could do the job, but I think that's much harder, and honestly, white is a better background for a lot of things than gray.

if you haven’t already done so, check out Kylie M Interiors blog. She has several posts about updating your walls from the early 2000’s. We had the same issue and her posts helped quite a bit.

Another option...

Oooh! I love it @lisedv. Now that dark blue-ish, grey, black is something I can get behind. What color is it? As a third entity, it eliminates the need to coordinate with the whites of the fixtures and greys of the tiles.

In the powder room, we were going to keep the wainscoting white and paint the walls and ceiling racoon fur. Would it be too repetitive to have two bathrooms with dark upper walls and neutral lower walls?

@apple_pie_order - Glass shelves are a great idea. They sort of disappear. I also have a set of metal wall shelves I've been carrying around and painting the same color as bathroom walls I've had. Maybe I put them up in here too or find something like them.

@Kendrah

I had only done a sketch showing a charcoal colour but I would think Kendrall charcoal would work but I can never say enough that you must look at colours in your room...

Photo from BM's website.

I love the Raccoon Fur idea for the walls and ceiling in the powder room! Will look amazing and I also think the existing mirror will work beautifully with that!

@lisedv’s idea for dark walls in the other bathroom is also great and is a nice option. Just depends on what you want to do. I tend to think that it may be more striking if you just have it in the powder room - as the showstopper. Plus, the travertine look has its own vibe, that can work well with light walls. Spa type thing. I know you are not finding those tiles very relaxing right now! But they could be more-so. The current wall color is really killing the whole look.

When i was trying out colors earlier, it seemed like the off-white/warm greys with red undertone looked the best to me.

Here’s another one I had done with PPG Shark. But ultimately, I preferred the Skimming Stone match.

I know you said the tiles have some greys in them, and I am not really seeing that in your pics - but in any case, these colors tend to complement and evoke the beach/shore- hence, spa type feeling.

So you just need to sample some colors in your space and see what looks good to you. I looked at the Kitten Whiskers. I love that name. Reminds me of F&B‘s Cats Paw. The Kitten Whiskers does look similar to Skimming Stone. And I see it has a pink undertone.

https://housekeepingbay.com/kitten-whiskers-1003-by-benjamin-moore

Thanks all. I will surely sample colors in the space. I like to narrow things down on the fan deck to a few and then get samplize swatches of the few. I move them around the room and look at them from different angles. It's just nice to know what colors people are suggesting as a starting point.

A skinny wall-mounted trash can may fit the bathroom where there's no room to put a trash can on the floor. I saw a clever flip-to-empty metal one in a Dutch train years ago.

If the top of your toilet tank is flat and reasonably level (it looks like it is), a low-ish wide basket or other container might work as a wastebasket. You might need to empty it more often than a proper wastepaper basket, but at least you'd have some place to put a used tissue or cotton swab, etc.

There are tons of toilet-tank baskets, boxes, and tins on Etsy and Amazon, among other online markets. Most are either twee or tacky IMO, but there are some handsome ones out there, too.

I guess it depends on whether you need that space to store other things.

A small basket inside the vanity could also work. Possibly hanging on the inside of a door.

If you can't wallpaper, then use a dark color like lisedv showed. Beautiful and dramatic. White is just so meh with your tiles. Safe and boring.

I might lean into greenish greys.

I would make sure I could upgrade the lighting before I painted a windowless bathroom in a dark gray color. It already looks/feels dark with the current beige walls.

Would you - @2pups4me -or anyone else like to glean from Kylie M's blog posts and report back to me? I love her advice when I can unearth it, but her blog drives me absolutely #$^!* bonkers.

With her kagillion ads on the page, single sentence paragraphs, and forced and utterly distracting humor, trying to obtain information from her blog feels like an immersion experience into the mind of someone with ADHD. You have to scroll 8 times just to get a singular piece of info. (And, I would like to start a drinking game for every time she uses the word wink.)

I'm sure I'll get some hate for this comment. I wouldn't care if she weren't so smart and likely full of really great info. Obviously others don't care because she is very popular and clearly makes a great living from all the ads and links. Kudos to anyone who can do that.

I love the impact of the dark color in this space. It is what I adore in a powder room, I just don't know if it is what I want for a primary bath. It feels too moody for my morning mind and make up application.

My husband busted a gut when I told him folks were urging a spa like feel in here. "This hideous room, spa like? No way!" But I think it is the way I am leaning.

I'd love to hang the curtain high but need it lower for air circulation in this humidity trap of a room.

The trash lives under the vanity, which works well with my tissue eating dog. (Gross.) There is no room for a wall hung anything in here.

Any gut thoughts about leaning in the direction white dove, sea pearl, cloud cover silver satin, calm, classic grey, grey mist, fog mist?

Again, I will get large samples. I'm just wondering if anyone has a "yikes stay away from this" reaction to leaning into a grey."

If you go neutral with paint, I’d get a patterned lux shower curtain that brings all the colors together - love the Schumacher Pretty Petals pattern that @Diana Bier Interiors, LLC posted - i’d be tempted to get a custom shower curtain figured out first and then match wall paint to the fabric

I'm leaning towards the spa factor. Pictured here is the primary bath in our former home was a few inches larger than our cinnamon toast crunch bathroom. (That's my new name for it!) We did a mini-spa like makeover for listing and it worked well. But, it had the advantage of a sky light, paintable walls, white tile, and pedestal.

I have and can repaint the little wall shelf, will order the same med cabinet. But cannot use a pedestal because the tile behind the sink is a disaster I don't want to take on and need to hide with a vanity.

Maybe I get crisp white towels, crisp white shower curtain, and use chantily lace in the cinnamon toast crunch bathroom? Or use a light grey towel, curtain, and wall?

As in @lisedv's suggestion from yesterday ?

The cinnamon toast crunch bath is in our second home - cheapy apartment close to my parents' to stay in when they need our help. I don't want to spend the money on beautiful yardage and don't have the bandwidth for that kind of shopping and ordering. Otherwise, @la_la Girl and @Diana Bier Interiors, LLC I'd jump on the shower curtain idea.

On my monitor: pinkish off white would be better with the tile than any of those gloomy grays.

The white bathroom is very nicely presented.

Grey makes me sad, but it's not my bathroom! I love so many of your suggestions for others, Kendrah, that I'm confident if you pick grey you will make it work.

I had to laugh at the tissue-eating dog. I kept wastebaskets in my cabinets in bath and kitchen when I had cats. With my own tissue-eating dog, I was in a new place with more room, and lidded wastebaskets worked well enough. My current dog is blessedly uninterested in eating paper of any kind, used or new.

I don't have any advice. I just wish you luck!

I did not set out to find grey wall paint colors, as I was looking around for colors that would work with the tile. Grey is usually the last thing that I suggest for wall paint color... Part of the reason for that is likely personal bias, because I would not want to have grey walls myself. But just overall - I feel that, in most cases, there are better colors for walls. However, as I was trying out whites and creams on the paint visualizer, I felt that they were too stark for the tile. I was looking for colors that would work with the tile- as well as be “soothing” - and lo and behold, I found myself in the grey territory. Now, when I say “grey territory” - in this case, I am talking about Taupe. I am not talking cool greys. I found that the right (light colored) greige could possibly bridge the gap and also offer the spa type feel that a travertine can lend itself to.

Here is a comparison of F&B Skimming Stone and BM Vintage Taupe.

https://plan-home.com/compare-colors/skimming-stone-241/benjamin-moore-vintage-taupe-2110-70

I tend to think Vintage Taupe might be a bit too light with the tile - but maybe it would not be, with the lighting. Might be another one to consider.

This is the general direction I would go in, but it’s not my place.

I hauled into the bathroom a big touch light with 3 different kelvin setting, threw out all of my research and ideas about what should work, and played with the fan deck. I ordered 5 samplize swatches for this bathroom, and a handful of others for bedroom, hall, and kitchen. I'm going to have fun on Tuesday when they arrive!

Thanks all for your input and perspectives. It is always so much easier to have ideas about other people's homes than it is my own. Funny how that works. :)

I agree with Freedom Place. I think the lighter colors with slight pink undertones, like vintage taupe might do it. Or perhaps White Zinfandel, (love the names these paint colors get!), or White Water Bay, which are similar to Vintage Taupe, and are all Benjamin Moore colors. So yeah, maybe you get a little white zinfandel to go with your cinnamon toast crunch-sounds horrible to eat, but might work as a color scheme with that tile. And of course, you never know until you get them into the actual room. Chantilly Lace might work, but it may appear stark next to that tile. You did a great job with your previous reno, so I think you will get this one looking better too. Even though it' won't be the style or bathroom of your dreams, it really is not so horrible. It at least appears clean-no ick factor there. And luckily you can be near your parents, but have your own space too, where you can decompress a little after the stresses of caregiving. Good luck. Post your after photos.

@kimbers333 - In the end I may come to think of this as having been a fun design challenge!

I am grateful that my mom is doing well enough now that I have the time and energy to start thinking about how this place looks. And, how to make it more inviting for other family members to come stay here too.

Another vote for a soft white with a pinkish undertone that matches the tile. When I zoom in on your photo, I like the grout color....maybe make sure to take that into consideration when you're putting up your samples and assessing? Walls would look good matching the grout.

At least on my monitor, the color of the countertop does seem a bit clashy (kind of an orange undertone) with the tile. Might be worth looking into switching out just the countertop. Can always paint vanity if you need to. Make sure the faucet & light are spiffy, new cabinet, artwork on wall,

neutral shower curtain, and you're done :)

I am glad to hear that your Mom is improving. It's not easy to be the one who needs care. Nor is it easy to be the caregiver. I hope that you all have a wonderful holiday season.

I would look for a match to the grout and anew shower curtain and I do not see the accent tile so just hide it with the curtain . 5 yrs will go by quickly then clean it and clean it agin and move on

Of the paint strips you showed further up, Cloud Cover seemed like a good match for the grout. There is always some color distortion from photos and monitors, so test in your space!

FWIW....A grout match feels a bit like a ticket to "meh"

Do a warm charcoal, add a shower curtain and light it up with electricity!

I'd just embrace it.

Will suggest greens, blues or warm neutral to act as a foil for the tile in your bathroom.

I know you had decided against the gray walls but I just saw on another post a view of the bathroom showing the entrance to the bathroom so I'm showing both views. If you keep some white in the room (ceiling, door, vanity, bathroom fixtures) I think it would balance the gray in the small bathroom.

Thanks for the additional pics @lisedv. In a room this size, I think you go big or go home. If I did the charcoal, I'd do the doors, walls, and ceiling. I do think it would look nice too.

But as the only full bath in the apartment, I'm opting to go with your first lighter "spa" look. I don't know that putting on make up and taking a morning shower is going to feel awake enough in a darker space. And when I go to sell, I think a more neutral white will feel more appealing.

We may go with simply white.

@lisedv and @JAN MOYER if you have any thoughts on sheen, please chime in here

https://www.houzz.com/discussions/6520471/what-the-shell-help-on-paint-sheens-please

Now I'm considering Florence plaster aka coastal fog.

Here's the look with your tiles:

This colour might be a different tone from what you presently have but I don't think it make a big difference visually from the colour you have now on the walls.

I think it’s very handsome on its own merits. Personally, I would not want any green or yellow shade reflected on my face while applying makeup, though. White, cream, or pink (especially pink) tones are better options for that purpose in my experience. Could the right sort of lighting mitigate against the sallowing effect of the olive paint?

@Kendrah - I know I am late to the party, but I have some additional questions. Is the flooring the same tile as the walls or something different? What other colors are you using in the hallway and bedrooms?

Are the doors and trim all white? What white are you using for the trim in the other rooms in the apartment.

How will this room relate to the other rooms in your home?

Here are a few colors I think would work with your tile. I am really liking October Sky, but can't always tell when working on the computer if it is actually right.

You are right on time @Jennifer Hogan because we have just finalized the rest of the paint colors for the apartment. Linen white walls and trim everywhere, except for the kitchen, which will be Maritime White, and powder room will be raccoon fur. (We had to have fun somewhere!)

The tile in this bathroom is a bit lighter and peachier than what shows on my screen. I tested out a larger swatch of Florentine plaster and the olive made the room feel every bit of the peach and sage 2000's look I'm trying to avoid. Thanks for the mock up @lisedv

At this point I think I'm back to using simply white in here. It won't be fantastic, but it will be crisp and clean when I go to sell. It may look good enough for someone to think, "This is non-offensive, when I move in here I'll paint it a perfect color instead." Perhaps by that time the peachy sage look will be back in style and this bathroom will be retro cool!