New bathroom, where to start ?

MassiveJim

MassiveJim

MassiveJim

Soldato
Joined
22 Feb 2014
Posts
2,983
We are in need of a new bathroom, I will likely do the entire demolition myself to save on costs.

I have no idea where to start in terms of sourcing it, getting it designed etc.
What brands I should be looking at etc.


What I do know, We will need bath, toilet, sink, shower and towel rad.
There is a cupboard that used to house a hot water tank that has been removed, I think the cupboard will need to go to make space for a shower, but then we would need somewhere to store all the towels in the house.
We plan to stay in the house long term, so spending a *bit* more is wise, but I don't have an endless pit of money.

The only 2 figures I have to work with are, my mate hwo is a plumber estimated full job at £8k, but there were no specifics
Just called into a local bathroom shop and they said ballpark for any bathroom is £12-14k (waaaaaaay out of our price range)


I would like to be somewhere around £4-6k
I don't even know where to start to get a design drawn up, does this have to be a bathroom place, or do people normally pay an interior designer ?
Are there particular brands to look at for fittings and for the suite itself ?

Fill me with knowledge OCUK.
 
Do you have anything in mind about how you want it to look?

Both B&Q and Wickes sell everything for bathrooms, and they would probably offer some of the cheapest prices on basic stuff, as well as more pricey stuff. If they don't have what you want, you can look further afield. The local independent is usually worth a look.

Re design, it would usually be whoever is going to fit it that would help you. Obviously where current services are comes into it, if you don't want to move pipes etc, which would get more expensive. An interior designer is more for style and would not usually be necessary unless you are very particular (and rich).
 
We have a very vague idea of what we want.
But I literally have no idea where to start with it. have only ever owned a new build before so didn't have to renovate anything.
 
If you've got a mate who's a plumber - I would utilise that link as much as possible. If you can't do the work yourself, that's likely the biggest way you can save.

I'd recommend looking at styles you like and then looking at how much all the individual components cost from trade type sites. Sites like

victoriaplum.com

Victorian Plumbing | Online Bathroom Specialist | Clearance Event.

Save big in our Summer Sale! Up to 60% Off showers, baths, suites, furniture & more! 4.5/5 Trustpilot | Free Delivery Over £499* | 0% Finance.
victoriaplum.com victoriaplum.com
www.victorianplumbing.co.uk

Victorian Plumbing | Online Bathroom Specialist | Clearance Event.

Save big in our Summer Sale! Up to 60% Off showers, baths, suites, furniture & more! 4.5/5 Trustpilot | Free Delivery Over £499* | 0% Finance.
www.victorianplumbing.co.uk www.victorianplumbing.co.uk

This can give you an idea of how much the actual bits involved cost. Also, how dramatic prices can vary depending on what styles you want.
 
Admittedly it is probably about 5 years ago now since we re-did our bathroom, but it cost roughly about £5K all in and this included -
  • Bath - we went for a wider than standard version and I forget how much more room it gives until I get in a standard size
  • Shower plumbed over the bath
  • Toilet
  • Wall-hung sink unit
  • Mirror with motion sensing light and de-misting function (wave your hand under the corner of the mirror and it switches the light on/off)
  • Vertical towel radiator
  • Taps, shower screen, extractor fan, etc
  • Fully tiled walls and floor
  • New ceiling lowered slightly and fitted with new spotlights

This also included rerouting the pipework slightly for the taps and waste for the bath as they were swapped to the opposite ends

If you know a plumber, they are a good place to start - we were recommended the one we used and he did everything as has a full team that can do electrical and tiling work as well. Initially, we only got him in to confirm whether or not we could make the changes we were thinking of as we weren't sure they were possible due to wanting to change the bath from a corner unit to a standard shape in the space available, but by the time he checked the sizes he had given us pretty much a full design of how it could all work in the small bathroom we have. We got some other quotes, but nothing could touch his price and it turned out to be the right decision for us - he even took us to his supplier to sit in a number of different bath styles (and widths) and view the various shower options to check them out before we made the final decision on what to buy

We even got his trade discount when we purchased the tiles as well from one of the suppliers in town - they asked who was fitting our bathroom and when we told them, they gave us his trade discount and said just to let them know when he would be ready for the tiles and wanted to pick them up, so we didn't even have to take them home and store them
 
TheCSSDoctor said:
Admittedly it is probably about 5 years ago now since we re-did our bathroom, but it cost roughly about £5K all in and this included -
  • Bath - we went for a wider than standard version and I forget how much more room it gives until I get in a standard size
  • Shower plumbed over the bath
  • Toilet
  • Wall-hung sink unit
  • Mirror with motion sensing light and de-misting function (wave your hand under the corner of the mirror and it switches the light on/off)
  • Vertical towel radiator
  • Taps, shower screen, extractor fan, etc
  • Fully tiled walls and floor
  • New ceiling lowered slightly and fitted with new spotlights

This also included rerouting the pipework slightly for the taps and waste for the bath as they were swapped to the opposite ends

If you know a plumber, they are a good place to start - we were recommended the one we used and he did everything as has a full team that can do electrical and tiling work as well. Initially, we only got him in to confirm whether or not we could make the changes we were thinking of as we weren't sure they were possible due to wanting to change the bath from a corner unit to a standard shape in the space available, but by the time he checked the sizes he had given us pretty much a full design of how it could all work in the small bathroom we have. We got some other quotes, but nothing could touch his price and it turned out to be the right decision for us - he even took us to his supplier to sit in a number of different bath styles (and widths) and view the various shower options to check them out before we made the final decision on what to buy

We even got his trade discount when we purchased the tiles as well from one of the suppliers in town - they asked who was fitting our bathroom and when we told them, they gave us his trade discount and said just to let them know when he would be ready for the tiles and wanted to pick them up, so we didn't even have to take them home and store them
Click to expand...
That's helpful thanks.

The plumber won't do electrics but I can do those as there won't be any significant changes, he won't do the design but I will try and pin him down and work something out.
I know he's got a lot going on at the minute though
 
Ours Sounds very similar to @TheCSSDoctor spent 5kish

We went from:
62612_121601_IMG_02_0000.jpg


Note the wall to the right and the bath was to the left behind that doorV skinny with a window above it.
To this:

bathroom1.jpeg


bathroom 2.jpeg



Storage and Wallmounted sink were from BnQ
Toilet BnQ
Extra wide bath was from a local bath fitter place
Vertical towel rad was from some random eBay page
Tiles were all wickes an they were dirt cheap compared to other places

I didn't think we'd be able to fit a shower due to the door, This one pivots around 30% of the way along the door (wasnt aware they did these)
Shower door was victoria plumb, Shower tray (1000x800) and shower system was Amazon (Bristan ARDE SHCCF W Artisan Evo )

Ceiling was a mess so it was ripped out and replaced with PVC cladding, looks great imho (and made fitting a celing speaker a doddle :)


Did all the destruction myself, had people in to fit everything and they were utter cowboys lol

You'll save yerself a lot sourcing the bits you want/like and then just paying for the trades I think
 
Spoke to my mate a bit more, he uses (almost exclusively) a company called easy bathrooms.
So we booked an appointment for a bathroom plan which was yesterday.
Up to now I have a plan and a quote, which has come in at £7600!!
The quote does include about 25m2 of tiles @ £1430 though
Hopefully I can utilise my mate's discount which should get us down to under £5k, but some things in there are just silly money and I will be buying elsewhere.

for example, backlit mirror at £450, I can get similar off ebay for £100 - £150
towel radiator - £472, again ebay £150ish

No idea what a bath should really cost either, an Ardite "superstrong" bath comes in at £500, bath panels almost £300. is that about right ?

shower screen and sliding door £800
shower tray 1400 x 800 - £620


electric underfloor heating
wet room boards, loose cable and thermostat about £360 which I didn't think was too bad actually.
 
I was on a uber budget when i did mine, so i hunted around for some of the big ticket items, for eg, i got a Mira shower tray (12*9) for 185. Tiles are a big expense, but its worth looking around for these aswell, in the west midlands we have a place called tile plus and they do nice tiles at cracking prices.

I found a local place on FB market place doing bathroom furniture and toilets/sinks. Again saved me a chunk.
 
O/H sourced the bath for the bathroom I'm refitting from FB marketplace. New £800, marketplace, £30. Yes thirty pounds. And it's immaculate other than some existing silicone and one or two very minor marks. If you're not overly fussy and really want to save on cost it's worth considering.

If you're handy and pick up new skills easily if the plumbing is basic you could probably do most of it yourself if it doesn't include major alterations.
 
We spent 8-10k on our bathroom just over 5 years ago.

Completely back to brick, new window, new floor, new ceiling, new everything. Went high end on the fittings, Axor Hansgrohe the lot.

Don’t regret it one bit it’s excellent and has worn well.

Best thing was a full width cut to size perfect shower tray and then the thickest single sheet of glass available as a shower screen with a single bar at the top to stabilise.
 
I renovated our bathroom at our 50s built semi we moved into last summer - it was a disabled wet room type setup with non-slip flooring and a sunken drain etc.

Had quotes of £3-5k labour only, not including any materials to sort the bathroom, anywhere up to double those figures for a complete “turn key” price. The main issue was lead time - we wanted to move into the house as soon as possible after completion (obviously), but until exchange, completion was always a moving target and nobody wanted to book the work in. When we did exchange contracts, everyone was looking at a 6 month waiting list to get the work done… We needed to replace the wet room setup with a proper bath for our toddler.

So, armed with YouTube, some books and a bit of reading of various forums I figured I’d do it myself. The plan was to do a decent job on a budget - nothing fancy pants, but a functional, normal family bathroom to last perhaps ten years or so.

Did everything myself including ripping the old wet room foooring out and laying a new sub floor, taking new hot and cold feeds from the airing cupboard and bringing the pipes through the wall for the bath, relocating the electric shower from chair height to the adjacent wall to make a shower over the new bath, new sink, new toilet, new vinyl floor.

Costs - £400 odd for the bath (went for a reinforced, higher end Ideal Standard bath), £50 for the sink and £80 for the toilet (both just normal white porcelain that look like a sink and a toilet and do the job just fine), £80 for some vinyl roll flooring. Another £80 or so for a glass bath shower screen, and then various sundries like sealant, plugs and wastes, copper, taps and connectors (I went for copper push fit stuff). The tiling in the original wet room was neutral and inoffensive so we’ve kept those and made as good a job as I can of solidly supporting the bath with battens on the wall and plenty of BT1 sealing it to the tiles and further beads of sealant around the top. The bath is solid and doesn’t move a millimetre, 8 months on and dry as a bone underneath.

In total I spent well under £1k and we’ve got a nice, serviceable and functional family bathroom. It may not be designer/fashionable with floating sinks, heated mirrors and a wall hung toilet with invisible cistern but I’ve learnt a bunch of new skills, know every inch of the construction so can fix any issues myself if they arise, and saved myself at least five thousand quid…. Some of which I may have used a bit of “man maths” to justify spending on some nice new tools…
 
We're having ours done right now. Similar size, similar items to be installed plus the toilet and bath are being moved so the waste and plumbing have to be reconfigured. Local bathroom place charging about £8.5k. We had a similar quote from another local. That's everything done for us, including demolition. He's already been at it 2 weeks and probably won't finish until mid-next week so there's a fair amount of labour involved.
 
In a solid wall (no cavity) 1930s house, what’s the best solution when it comes to replastering the bathroom walls? (Full tiles in shower, half tiles elsewhere).

Is a cement base board best (e.g hardiebacker) or should it have insulation?

If it requires insulation, is a stud wall therefore required on top of the solid wall? (I’ve not seen insulated cement base board).

Thanks.
 
if the sink and toilet are staying in place not hard to do .. 2-4 screws on each .. tiling get some one in .. bath? easy to do yourself .. bathroom units are as cheap as you want them ..
£4-6k is well within reach ..
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Back
Top Bottom