Go with what you love, not whether it is "dated" or not. Anything you do will be dated in the not-too-distant future. What's your actual bathroom and what are the inspo pics?

Whatever you do please don't carry your counter curb backsplash onto your tower cabinet!

Thank you all! Agreed that it would have looked better to move the tower to the right side of the vanity, but the plumbing is already in place unfortunately. While my description of my husband's comment was "too much marble," it was actually "too much marble and too much white". The same picture you shared showing the tub and white subway tile is exactly the picture I showed him after he said he didn't want marble everywhere - he didn't like it :(. But one of the other interesting floor tiles could also work with subway tile on the walls.

While I totally agree with going with what we love, it's sometimes hard to separate what I like right now because I see it everywhere vs what I love for >5 years. Muted teal or aqua has been a lifelong favorite color, so that's about the only color I'm willing to commit to for more than a few years. All of the pictures are of our actual bathroom. The first two are renderings from the deigner; the others are AI edits done by us trying to imagine alternate options using materials that we like.

Are your cabinets wood or white? Not sure which rendering is correct.

We don't have cabinets yet. We met with the cabinet maker today and told him to work on the rest of the house first because we're still trying to figure out this bathroom :). The plumbing and electric are done and sheetrocking is in progress for the house overall, but no tile has been purchased for this bathroom and the cabinetry construction has not yet started.

Not that I care about things being ”dated”, a lot of the things I see on this site would be considered ”dated ” already, depending upon the location of course. Just get what you love or want, without worrying about it becoming dated at some point. It will.

Ask what your husband would like. He doesn’t want marble, plain white, or grey. You don’t want colored tile. So what would he like?

There are more historic looks that won’t pinpoint you directly to the 2020s and are more evocative of craftsman style, but given the flooring you selected, I suspect that is not the direction you want to go in.

I think you and he need to sit down for a good hour or two and scour bathroom pics for looks you like. Ignore configurations and just look at finish combos to find an influence you are going for.

Your photos from the designer most certainly will seriously date the bathroom to mid-2020s.

Stay with the original design of the home.

I'm not entirely familiar with Houzz and whether there's a way to have a reply directly to a previous comment - but I was replying to Kendrah originally. There have been two other comments in the meantime.

I have spent countless hours doing exactly that with varied success getting the hubby to engage. This post was in the desperation of trying to find something that we both are at least mostly happy with since it's an expensive project and our primary bath, and I am pretty burned out. I appreciate the suggestions you made in your last post! My primary desire is that there is an interesting pattern somewhere and that the floor has enough color variation in it to camoflouge my crazy-shedding hair. Carrara does pretty well for that but there are other options. In trying to get him to look for inspiration pictures that he likes, the themes that we could identify are that doesn't like things to be busy but also doesn't want a lot of a single color. That's a lot easier to achieve in a bigger space than a compact one. That's also how we ended up with the plans from the designer being what they are in my original post (the pictures with grey tile, blue lower wall, and white upper wall) - those pictures are pretty depressingly "blah" to me, and my husband is only "ok" with them. We are both "more OK" with the second picture that shows muted green subway tile; we've gone on a search locally for a tile that would fit the bill for this design and haven't found anything that's not really textured, or matte, or a significantly darker green than we want, etc. I'm going to order some samples from Heritage Tile, so maybe that will work!

Daltile - spa color - color wheel collection. Is this they type of aqua you like or something more intense? This collection comes in 4x4, 6x6, 3x6. It is great quality. With thin groutlines, you can create nice patterns that are not going to date the look. This pattern guide shows different ways of laying them out. https://s7d9.scene7.com/is/content/daltile/DAL_ColorWheel-Classic_TilePatternGuidepdf

Would your husband like white and marble tiles more if there were saturated colors above them?

Or medium or light toned blues and teals as the paint color with white or marble?

if you really want a colored tile that is gloss and has interest look at Bedrosians Marin tile. The misty blue is lovely and we are currenly using the Aloe color in a beach homes owner suite we are working on. The tiles have beautiful color variation in them.

On another note, from the photos it looks like the vanity placement will make it difficult ’ to access the tub taps?

In trying to get him to look for inspiration pictures that he likes, the themes that we could identify are that doesn't like things to be busy but also doesn't want a lot of a single color. That's a lot easier to achieve in a bigger space than a compact one.

Agreed! This is where an incredibly skilled designer comes into play, one that is fantastic with mixing varied colors. It is beyond the scope of most average designers. It is a fun challenge from the outside, but must be a fatiguing task when it is your own home. Your husband sounds like mine - he says he doesn't care too much but it turns out he has really refined taste that isn't commonly found in most inspo pics.

I'm going to go on the hunt for you for some more inspo pics and color samples. I suspect you might find better inspiration among British designers and bathrooms than what you typically find on Houzz.

I hear you on the hair shed. Are you against a patterend tile floor? I find mable mosaics very slippery in a bathroom, though others on here disagree with me.

A contrasting cove trim tile at the base and/or a line of trim in a contrasting color at the top of the tub splash could help break up the feel of too much of a single color without making the room feel too busy.

My mock up skills suck, but here are some versions in your bathroom. I wouldn't do it with as large of a format tile, but ...

You could also just be brave and really go for a patterned floor in here. These are Daltile, You can pick and choose any color combo.

You’ll lose so much counter space with the cupboard sitting on the counter. Think kitchen “garages” that look very 1998.

Thank you again for all of the good ideas. We're going to try visiting the Daltile showroom again on Friday and have a lot of different ideas to think through.

Re: the tub faucet, there's an 8" gap between the vanity and tub in the final design. It's not ideal, but you can reach the faucet fine. We weren't personally concerned about counter space as this design has more counter space than what we currently have. I wish the linen tower part had ended up on the side as someone else suggested but wasn't personally bothered giving up countertop for towel storage.