Update Your Bathroom This Weekend

It’s a well-known fact that attractive, functional bathrooms help sell homes. If yours can use some updates, but you don’t have room in the budget to hire a professional, we have some tips for you. Not only are these fixes inexpensive, but you can complete them over the course of a weekend!

Start with the Walls – Enliven the entire room with a fresh coat of paint. Light-colored walls can make a tiny bathroom seem roomier, so stick with white, cream or light green or blue in the diminutive bathroom. Don’t forget to paint the ceiling in the same tone. Larger rooms can handle more vibrant colors.

Ditch the old Mirror – Every bathroom has one, but not every bathroom designer chooses to seize the opportunity to use the mirror as a design element. If your existing mirror is a mere slab of reflective glass, ditch it and find something sexier.

Update the Dated – While bathroom cabinets don’t take quite the beating of those in the kitchen, they are exposed to more humidity and different products that can leave them looking battered and dated. You don’t need to replace them, however. Remember, we want this done in a weekend, so grab some paint and slap it on those cabinets! HGTV has an amazing step-by-step walk-through of the project. Steal the ideas to use in your bathroom.

Hardware Too – You can’t very well have new-looking cabinetry with old, dated hardware. Get to one of the big box home improvement stores and choose new pulls and knobs to complement the “new” cabinets.

Lighten Up – New light fixtures should be next on the list, especially if you currently have those strip vanity lights, ala what you’d find in a movie star’s dressing room. If you can’t afford new lighting and the movie star treatment must remain, at least move the strips to either side of the mirror. Lighting above the mirror casts “strong light onto your forehead and casts deep shadows below your eyes, nose, and chin,” lighting expert Randall Whitehead tells Houzz contributor Tiffany Carboni. He claims this type of lighting makes shaving and applying makeup more challenging and suggests sconces at eye-level on both sides of the mirror.

The Rest is Fluff – Feel free to accessorize with bargain-basement stuff you can find on Craigslist, at flea markets, or garage sales, and thrift stores. Most anything can be painted, polished or repurposed to fit your design theme.