Bathroom gets some love (apart from the ugly storage bit)

The bathroom was in need of some love. 

It was looking a little cluttered and untidy around the edges.

But the real motivation was the paintwork...

Hmmm. So it got a weekend transformation. The paint looks white in these photos, but it's a lovely shade of a white-that's-a-little-bit-green – a Dulux mix. 

I was shocked to discover that B&Q had stopped selling Dulux paint, and so we were unable to colour match the original pot. I got the colour scanned and remixed in the new brand they are stocking, Valspar, which I'd never heard of; it was a little bit darker, but seeing I was painting the whole room it was close enough (though not so good for touching up the living room, annoyingly, also in the same shade of Dulux but not in need of a complete repaint). 

The walls needed some sanding to get all that flaky paint off. And once repainted, a little bit of a rearrange and declutter...

The one thing I still have to do is sort out the messy storage at the end of the bath. I can't find any nice waterproof storage boxes quite the right dimensions, so I'm thinking of just getting some doors made and tiled in the same tiles, and a shelf built inside. My boyfriend says that tiled cupboard doors is what grannies have. But I have met some cool grannies, and in the absence of any better ideas... well... what do you think?

The shower rail, fitted years ago, is way too high (my fault, I don't know what I was thinking...). And the grey things the curtain hangs from are annoying – they go with the rail and no others slide around the bend. But the whole thing suddenly looked less wrong when I bought and chopped up a length of chain to hang the curtains from. I saw the idea on holiday in Mississippi last year, in the bathroom of the amazing shacks we stayed in.

The curtain is very creased as it has just come out of the washing machine, but life is surely too short to iron shower curtains.

The side of the bath isn't new but in case you're interested, is made from off-cuts from the decking in the garden. Cheap and rather "Nordic sauna", I think.

The big palm picture on the left was a falling-to-bits piece of printed silk, stretched over a canvas. My parents had it, unframed, in their bedroom at the house I grew up in. When they tired of it, it got passed down to me and, over the years, bits of silk started ripping and peeling away from the canvas. I love it dearly and hoped a frame might save it... so far, it's holding up. It replaced a lovely, colourful trio of these water themed John Hinde images, but right now I think the greens make for a more relaxing space.

The black image is actually a metal advertising sign I picked up on a youthful holiday to Thailand – even in beach paradise, I have to scour the local flea markets. But I'd got really sick of it; the corners were curling and it just looked tatty. I was ready to move it on, but my boyfriend liked it and suggested getting it framed. Good move: the black gives it a fresh drama and presence, I think.

The amazing-bargain-stool I have written about before. Here it is in its previous home, doing the same job.

The bathroom floor needs a little spruce now too, since my painting floor protection didn't quite go to plan.

However, this time it's the sink that's a bit high, not the mirror. That said, the mirror's previous position was perfect for me (at 5'2") but not so good for the man of the house (at over six feet). It seemed only fair to raise it, and I did have the stool after all... Until we came up with the more mutually convenient idea of hanging the mirror vertically rather than horizontally (see earlier picture). Bingo.

The framed magazine cover was the best leaving present ever. I got it from my first job in journalism and it came, would you believe it, from the guy doing work experience there. (Happily he went on to have a glittering journalism career – nice one Dan Jones, what a star.)

The magazine was called 19, but it had started out life in the 1970s as a magazine called Honey, and Dan managed to unearth an original copy: voila my leaving present. It had been around the house in various positions, loose, and was getting a little battered. Time to do some more preservation work and stick it in a frame. I like the contrast of the battered paper with the clean white background.

Another very good and also old magazine cover in a frame now sits on the other side of the basin, topping – now – an altogether less busy shelf. It is the cover of Life magazine announcing man's imminent first trip to the moon, in 1969.

I tried digital in the bathroom, but battery life was an issue, so for a while I was after a classic, solid FM number. This one was a recent find at a car boot sale for a couple of quid. It's so gloriously 80s, and works a treat.

What with the lovely, super cheap new door accessories we added a little while back, the bathroom's mini makeover is very nearly there.

Post by Kate