When Laura Larson and her husband Tom Arrison decided to remodel the master bath in their townhouse-style condo, they hired Don Manthey of Manthey Construction Services.
After an initial meeting, Manthey suggested they speak with Paola McDonald, an interior designer with Creative Elegance Interiors.”When people aren’t sure about what they want, I tell them to talk with a designer,” Manthey said.
The old bath was a typical and tight Jack-and-Jill. “You could touch the shower curtain from the toilet,” Manthey noted. It also had three doors to maneuver around: one entrance from the master bedroom, another from the hallway and a third door to the toilet.
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| MantheyConstruction.com |
| CreativeEleganceInteriors.com |
| ntimedesignllc.com |
“It just didn’t work,” Larson said.
McDonald drew up plans to increase storage, open the space and infuse color in a sophisticated yet fun style.
“They wanted something fresh, unique and very fun, to match the rest of the condo and their personalities,” McDonald said. “They allowed me so much freedom to play with color and pattern.”
The couple loves color. Their master bedroom is purple. The hallway is orange. The living room is light green and the kitchen is blue.
So McDonald started with a dazzling blue and green backsplash. The backsplash, Windblend Seaside Mosaic Recycled Glass Tile from TAC Tile, provided the inspiration for the rest of the bath. The walls were painted in Waterfall by Benjamin Moore.
“You don’t get a lot of room in smaller bathrooms to make a big impact, but this mosaic certainly does the trick,” she said. “This bathroom would have felt a little boring if it didn’t have that splash of color and texture back there.”
Wall-mounted faucet fixtures from Moen freed up counter space. A small linen closet was removed and his and hers pantry-style cabinets, from NTime Design, were added to create more functional storage. And those doors were replaced with pocket doors.
Another wow factor in the bath is the three-form poly-resin shower panel, “the perfect way to add punches of color and texture without making the space feel heavy,” McDonald said. “The pattern on the panel looks like water drops.”
When using bright colors, McDonald suggests offsetting then with neutrals to avoid a “kiddie bath” look.
“Also keep your lines clean and keep your accessories minimal and of a grown-up subject matter,” she said.
Larson appreciated that Manthey suggested McDonald. “It’s through her creativity that we got such a great look that compliments the rest of the house,” Larson said.
“Contractors for the most part are not designers. They can help a client make some decisions but most I’ve met do not want the responsibility of giving design advice that the client may ultimately not end up happy with,” McDonald said.
