How to retrofit your en - Anhui Flush Plate Co.,Ltd

Good planning to the millimetre will help your installer get it right first time. Picture: iStock

Our national obsession with the all-singing-and-dancing, dedicated en-suite shower room or bathroom for every bedroom endures.

Still, unless you can enjoy it without slinking through, core braced, all but oiled up, I would think again. The "room" refers to centimetres on the tape. Chic lighting, reflective surfaces or expansive colour will not conjure elbow room. No hotel with one trembling star rating will ignore room to manoeuvre and drifting mammalian scents.

Ergonomics, that ease of use, comes first—ahead of tile, ahead of colour, ahead of it all. If you’re taking a spatial bite out of a modest bedroom, but have access to a well-appointed family bathroom, think about improving that space first. Potential buyers will spot that desperation en-suite crouched behind a touch of stud work in dimensions better left to a double-wardrobe.

Mean, cloakroom basins are that first hint of compromise and are unlikely to wash up that feted 5% for every extra bathroom on your home’s sale.

Measuring up, master’s average out around two square metres which, while not huge, is enough practical wander with a properly fitted suite. The smallest space you can fit a bijou en-suite shower room is generally considered to be 800mm x 1800m.

Dimensions of 2100mm x 1200mm are a better prospect for our room-in-a-room. Householders do go smaller, but it all starts to get a bit shoulder-raising. Use the CAD technology of your bathroom supplier, your architect and/or builder’s experience, graph paper, tape on the floor — everything possible especially when going direct (or self) labour. In the loft, set any shower in the highest spot you can surrender.

Be highly strategic when choosing and laying out a suite to optimise its comfortable performance. Measure out ideal interior dimensions, including partition wall depths accurately. Stout 100m stud-work (you could go structurally lighter to 75mm) with 12.5mm water-resistant plasterboard (such as Gyprock Moisture Board) taped, skimmed and tilled will add up to 131mm plus.

Consider the inward/outward door swing of 800mm which can devour room and create collisions with toes/toilets etc. What about a roller door set on the wall or a pocket door set inside it? Acoustic insulation in rolls or batts (65mm is popular) will prevent the transmission of rude, resonant noise, but a pumped shower will purr out.

What’s your utter limit in terms of showering area? The only test that means anything is amateur dramatics on the showroom floor. Get into staged set-ups and close the door. Raise your arms to shampoo your hair (bring your partner to ensure they are comfortably accommodated).

The space required from the front edge of each element—toilet, basin, door—is around 760mm, and for the shower itself, 600mm is close. Tape measurements onto your floor and ramble out of the “shower” naturally to see if you’re nosing a wall.

Determined to have a bath? Short “P” and “D” baths with a shower at one end can operate as their own tray. We found 1500mm x 750mm Moods Bathrooms to Love, at just €589 for a bath, panel and screen in acrylic for €589, bathshack.com.

Offset quadrants and even corner showers can deliver elegant solutions. With sliding doors — their talents really are legendary. A corner-entry shower stall can preserve enough of the wall it’s hugging for a loo, hooks, towel radiator or a skinny storage cabinet. Start with a 760mm by 760mm corner cabinet with a good magnet detailed door that will shut tight.

Pentangle corners are rare water birds, but B&Q offer a Good Home 890mm x 890mm Ezile at €620 including a black tray. Quadrants enclosures add one longer side, retaining that ergonomic soft corner with the door in-set, and can be shifted around on a CAD screen. Explore 900mm by 760mm up to 1200 x 900mm in trays in alternative directions.

With the deluge of an overhead rain shower, a step back with a longer tray will make all the difference. Prices for superb Renu and Merlyn quadrant enclosures in 6mm glass, start from €330 (Tubs & Tiles). With a niched, rectangular shower or wet room using a single run of glass panels—establish your tray size, and then think about door/no-door allowing at least 600mm of the entryway.

Sliders and pivot door actions in 6mm-8mm depths of glass can be all but frameless or braced from bars on the ceiling for less visual stutter—explore the latest in design detailing, including trending fluted glass panelling like Nuie (800mm, €319, Bath Shack). Building out that bespoke splash spot, Sonas offers quality 700mm Aspect wet-room panels are priced from €405 with flipper doors from €285.

For recesses and shelving built into the wall, ensure your contractor adds an increased depth of stud or blockwork, and set out any integral lighting at your first fix of electrics. Heavy studs will cut down on noise and vibration where the walls are supporting sheets of heavy glazing.

Low-profile shower trays deliver the feel of a wet room without the additional expense of complete room tanking and in-set tile floors. They are trickier to handle if your plumber must reach under the shower to fix any wastewater problems. Think access, before burying any plumbing into the walls or floor.

A standard loo, even with a tall slender cistern, will demand up to 700mm depth, while a short projection or corner model, can take this right down to 650mm or even 500mm. Truly deeply challenged? Use an integrated all-in-one vanity/toilet unit.

The clearance around any toilet is best retained at 760mm with 15mm-20mm (for a man’s out-turned feet) between a free-standing bowl and any furniture or panels. Shroud the base to hide that ghastly U-bend. With the plumber satisfied with a waste position, what about an in-cabinet cistern? It could be set in a run of stud wall with a deep, glorious counter space that runs onto your vanity area.

Lighting in an en-suite is determined by the IP safety rating. Choose at least IP67 in the shower or above the bath, and IP67 or IP44 for everywhere else. Look for lights, including recessed products with a good guarantee on the housing, as even with good ventilation they will be pounded with moisture daily.

Dimly lit showers behind short blind partitions of stud work are depressing and potentially dangerous. LED spotlights won’t dangle into the planes of space. Considering electric UFH? Inform the tiler and give your electrician the heads-up.

We must ventilate the en-suite adequately to prevent condensation, and ultimately mould and rot to wood elements. A mechanical, timed IP45, 15l/s, 12V, 100mm extractor fan ducted up and out through the attic, or through the wall is an inescapable expense. Choose from basic, timed, motion detecting and humidistat models and have a RECI-qualified electrician do the wiring in.

A window is not a regulatory requirement if your artificial lighting and ventilation is perfected. Roof windows can pour light into pinched space. Any laminate flooring choice (6mm-12mm) must be waterproof not simply water-resistant to survive. AC ratings are for abrasion not waterproofing. Budget for 18mm marine-ply sub-flooring where needed and watch those finished floor levels between the bedroom and en-suite.

Smart storage is a vital moment. Customise a bespoke solution for a tricky situation. Never surrender that storage space under the basin unless you have room to stage cupboards, shelves, and drawers elsewhere. Take the vanity unit to the floor for an extra drawer. The only thing you’re losing is a clean swipe with the mop under a wall-hung vanity.

Slender, tall 300mm deep storage towers can stand or hang, back to the wall and even revolve. Bare plasterboard with strong studs should carry 32Kg — important if you’re “floating” elements.

For a vanity, the average depths are 450mm. Look for rounded corners that are kind to a bare hip for all your furniture and vanity pieces. LED, Bluetooth-enabled mirrors (flying off the shelves) advance only 15cm from the wall. Never have these talents in vertical wall storage and lighting mattered more and yes, they come in cabinet types too.

Made-up furniture? I’m all aflutter for the Scandi’ inspired Kora range from Sonas, in a wistful Morning Sky Blue; 500mm (width) from €695, teamed with its Astrid rope supported mirror €485 — just gorgeous, sonasbathrooms.com.