A Rustic Setting and a Paint Mistake Create Drama in the Bathroom
Near-black walls, wood features and elegant surfaces personalize this lake house bathroom
Style. You can’t see it from inside the bathroom, but the woodsy lakeside site inspired the design. (This view out the dining room windows gives you a good idea of the setting.) “We wanted the style to say ‘lake house’ but not typically coastal or themed,” the designer says. White oak on the vanity, a whimsical faux trophy and pine on the mirror frame bring in rustic forest-inspired touches. But she balanced them out with more elegant touches, like the marble shelf with the twiggy silver-leafed brackets over the loo, the elongated subway tile and the beautiful patterned tile floor.
Flooring. “This is my favorite budget-friendly tile. It looks beautiful, and it’s very easy to maintain,” Steidley says. It has the look of more expensive encaustic cement tile but is digitally printed ceramic tile. (At publication time, the price of the tile was under $6 per square foot.)
Wall color: Cyberspace, Sherwin-Williams; shelf: World Market; floor tile: Merola Tile, Home Depot; browse bathroom floor tile
Flooring. “This is my favorite budget-friendly tile. It looks beautiful, and it’s very easy to maintain,” Steidley says. It has the look of more expensive encaustic cement tile but is digitally printed ceramic tile. (At publication time, the price of the tile was under $6 per square foot.)
Wall color: Cyberspace, Sherwin-Williams; shelf: World Market; floor tile: Merola Tile, Home Depot; browse bathroom floor tile
Vanity. The vanity was custom made, crafted from white oak with a wire-brushed finish and topped with quartz. Note the curved detail at the edges of the backsplash, which gives it a look that’s more like furniture and less like typical cabinetry.
Faucets. The plumbing fixtures in polished chrome add shine to the room.
Faucets: Miseno; quartz countertop: Colorado White, Maestro Surfaces
Faucets. The plumbing fixtures in polished chrome add shine to the room.
Faucets: Miseno; quartz countertop: Colorado White, Maestro Surfaces
Lighting. With the dark walls in place, Steidley knew she’d need to amp up her lighting scheme to brighten the room, located on the lower level. She added some downlights and chose sconces with mirrored backplates to maximize reflection of the light. The seeded glass on the shades has a wavy, bubbled texture.
Mirror. She also chose a mirror that would make the most of the lighting. The wide frame is beveled and mirrored. “It’s very dramatic, but the white pine keeps it down to earth,” she says.
Sconces: Feiss; mirror: Pompano, Bassett Mirror Co.; find more bathroom mirrors
Mirror. She also chose a mirror that would make the most of the lighting. The wide frame is beveled and mirrored. “It’s very dramatic, but the white pine keeps it down to earth,” she says.
Sconces: Feiss; mirror: Pompano, Bassett Mirror Co.; find more bathroom mirrors
Artwork. The 1970s sailing photos were a great score from the Round Top antique market in Texas about four years ago. Steidley hung onto them knowing she’d find just the spot for them someday. They are from White Rock Lake, a lake outside of Dallas that the family knows well. “I just love them. They have this almost iridescent quality that photographs from the ’70s had, and there are all these fun details in them like funny-looking old lifesavers,” Steidley says. The grouping pops against the deep dark walls and is the only coastal touch in the room.
Shower. The shower is generously sized at 3 by 7 feet. Elongated subway tile (4 inches by 16 inches) updates a classic look.
Takeaways
How to Remodel Your Bathroom
Browse bathroom stories
Find a bathroom design pro
Shower. The shower is generously sized at 3 by 7 feet. Elongated subway tile (4 inches by 16 inches) updates a classic look.
Takeaways
- Sometimes you should consider embracing an accident as a happy one and just go with it.
- Digitally printed ceramic and porcelain tile can give you the patterned look of encaustic cement tile for about a third of the cost.
- Consider the edges of your backsplash when you have a freestanding vanity. The simple curves on the backsplash here elevate the style of the vanity.
- Small details like seeded glass can enhance a design by bringing in interesting textures.
- Experiment with sharp contrast, whether with black and white or a glam mirror and rustic pine.
- If you really, truly fall in love with an antique or flea market find, you will have a place for it someday. Give yourself a five-year limit and, if you don’t ever have a good spot, let it go.
How to Remodel Your Bathroom
Browse bathroom stories
Find a bathroom design pro
Bathroom at a Glance
Who lives here: A couple of retirees who have a smaller home in town
Location: On Lake Texoma in Oklahoma (the lake straddles Texas and Oklahoma)
Size: 84 square feet (7.8 square meters); 12 by 7 feet
Designer: Staci Steidley
The most striking thing about this Oklahoma bathroom was actually a happy accident. Interior designer Staci Steidley had specified off-black shiplap for the bathroom’s vanity wall (as an accent wall) and for the rest of the room to be painted white. Somehow there was a communication breakdown and her painter painted the whole room the dark color. Though it was not what she’d asked for, everyone was gobsmacked by how striking it was. “This room doesn’t get any natural light, so we all thought black would be out of the question, but it turned out that we all loved it,” Steidley says.
“We all” refers to the designer’s own family. Steidley was the interior designer on the project, and her brother, Aaron Adam, owner of homebuilding company
Develacon, was the contractor. He was the one who first noticed the paint mistake and called Steidley to come check out the pleasing result before deciding whether to repaint the rest of the walls white.
The house is their parents’ second home and is in a wooded rural area on a lake. “My parents actually live in a much smaller house in a small town but built this with all of us gathering for holidays together in mind,” she says. Now that her parents are retired, they spend about three days a week in town and four out here at the lake.