Ugly Bathroom. Small Changes. Big Difference.

The GOOD NEWS is my basement has a bathroom. The BAD NEWS is my basement has a bathroom! The "before" photos will explain that statement!

This is a half-bath located in the basement of my fixer-upper, and it is literally at the bottom of my list of rooms to rennovate. I cringed everytime I saw the bathroom, so I coped by keeping the door shut, but it still bothered me, so I decided to give it a quick makeover until we get the basement updates underway. 

I don't feel too much pressure to get the design just right since my changes are only a temporary fix until we start working on the basement. But I am focused on keeping the costs to a bare minimum. For now I am focused on the walls, floor, and adding some storage.

UPDATE: I re-stenciled the bathroom floor to coordinate with my newly stenciled basement floor. You can see the new results HERE! You can read about the basement floor and tutorial HERE.

I have three days and $300 to freshen up the bathroom.

The room measures 8 feet x 6 feet and contains a small vanity and a tan 1970's toilet along the back wall. We will replace the toilet and the vanity once we eventually add new flooring in the basement. 

Vintage Basement Bathroom

I will take advantage of the unused empty space and create some extra storage. Luckily I have an extra cabinet that will fit the space, but it will need a quick makeover. But first, let's take a look at how I refreshed the bathroom.

I will paint this cabinet and use it for bathroom storage.

WALLS:

The lower half of the walls had quite a bit of wear and tear. So instead of repairing all the damage to the drywall my husband installed wainscotting on the lower half of the wall. I painted the top portion of the walls using some leftover paint. 

Wainscotting added over damaged drywall.

FLOORS:

The floor is the original concrete. 

Original concrete floor will be stenciled.

There is a residue of swirly ridges on top of the concrete from some sort of adhesive, a remnant from a previous unknown flooring. Luckily it isn't sticky, but it is rock solid, so I am unable to smooth it out. I will just have to work with it the way it is. 

Concrete floor before painting.

After cleaning and prepping the floor, I rolled on two coats of black over the existing concrete. It looks better already I think. 

First coat of paint on concrete floor.

The vanity was removed prior to painting. Technically the toilet should be removed, too. But I didn't want to fool around with that until such time as we install a new floor and purchase a new toilet. So you will see that I just worked around it for now. 

Preparing to stencil the concrete floor.

The concrete will eventually be covered with new flooring so why not have some fun and play with stencils? To keep this article from being too long, I will write a separate article about the step-by-step process of stenciling the floor.  But for now I will summarize: I loaded a foam roller with paint and then off-loaded most of the paint onto a paper towel before rolling it over the stencil.

Rolling paint over the floor stencil.

Remember the concrete floor wasn't smooth to begin with, so I wasn't expecting perfection. But I think overall I did a smashing job!

Lifting the stencil after applying the paint!

THE BIG REVEAL:

Are you ready for The Big Reveal? Let's take a look . . .

The big reveal after refreshing the basement bathroom.

I needed some artwork for the long wall but didn't want to spend too much. So I purchased some frames from Amazon (affiliate link to the actual product I purchased).

Refreshed bathroom on a small budget.

I filled the frames with pages from a calendar of outhouses. I found the calendar marked down to $1 as it was from a prior year. It's a great way to re-use old calendars!

Inexpensive DIY art using an old calendar.

The outhouse photos lend a whimsical touch to the room. But it's easy to switch out the pictures, so I might update them later.

Collection of whimsical outhouse photos in bathroom.

Remember the cabinet from the beginning of this article? I painted it while the floor paint was drying. I used the same black paint that I used on the floor.

Cabinet painted black for neutral color scheme.

The black color works nicely in the room, and the cabinet fills the previously empty space and provides lots of extra storage.

Painted storage cabinet in bathroom.

Here's a close up of the stenciled floor. I tried to vary the amount of paint I used while stenciling to give it a worn vintage feel. 

Stenciled concrete floor.

Overall it was a fun project and the changes made me feel better about the room for the time being. I will work on a final design for this space once we get the rest of the basement finished.

Hexagon stencil on concrete floor.

WHAT DID THE "REFRESH" COST?

Wainscotting about $200 from Home Depot. (My husband tells me it was closer to $300 with supplies, the chair rail and baseboard trim.) If your walls are in good shape you could skip this step and simply paint.

Stencil Metro Hex Tile $40 from Cutting Edge Stencils

The rest of the materials I already had on hand. So my cost was between $240 and $340 depending on who you ask. The following is a list of the additional items I used with an approximation of what it might cost if you need to buy new.

Wall paint I used leftover paint, but it was a small area so figure $20.

Stencil adhesive $5. I've had this for a while and didn't need to buy new. But wow the price has gone up. Shop around and expect to pay closer to $10. It's worth it though to get a better result with your stencil.

Paint for floor $25 (I used leftover paint from previous projects and purchased the paint on sale, so this is an estimate.) Colors used were Iron Gate and Linen.

Misc: I sealed the floor with three coats of Polycrylic, rollers, paint tray, painters tape, etc. all of which I always have on hand.

Project Timeline: Day one I painted the upper portion of the wall. Day two my husband installed the wainscotting. Day three I painted and stenciled the floor. I painted the storage cabinet the same day while the floor paint was drying. I sealed the floor on the fourth day and hung the art on the wall.

Before and after photos of basement bathroom.

HOW HAS THE STENCIL FLOOR HELD UP?

I stenciled the floor about a year ago. The room only gets used periodically, but it has held up to regular vacuuming and mopping.

Easy update to bathroom with paint.