You know your powder room needs some TLC when you stumble bleary-eyed into the space and audibly sigh. The beige walls were tired, the builder-grade mirror spotted and cheap, and really, the whole space made me feel like I was painting my condo decor to match a petrol station restroom. That said, there’s one major benefit to tiny bathrooms: They’re the perfect low-stakes training wheels for renovation.
Mistakes can be limited to forty square feet , after all. I’d been avoiding facing my sad half-bath for months. Thinking about renovating it was overwhelming, and every day I kept telling myself it’d be more expensive than I could really justify.
Spoiler alert: Neither of those things was true. In fact, quite the opposite.
A few small swaps gave my bathroom the biggest glow up of all my rooms, and I learned that a shower is optional when redoing a small bathroom.
Here’s how to make the most impactful changes to your powder room, and how to do it on the cheap. Mirror, mirror on the wall Say it with me: Paint colours look different in store lighting. Been there, done that, hated every toilet bowel I tried.
That’s why picking up a new mirror at a local estate sale ended up being the first upgrade to my bathroom. I was tooling around for parts (aka Saturday morning people watching and treasure hunting is my JOYN), when I spotted this beautiful round mirror framed with thin brass detail. Sold for £25, the woman behind the counter told me it was from her daughter’s flat and hardly used at all.
I whipped out my phone and held it up to the rectangular mirror that came with the condo, and suddenly visions of mirrors danced in my head. Ditching the old mirror took about fifteen minutes with a drill bits and some light prying. Hanging the new one was as easy as attaching some brackets and – poof! – it transformed the whole space.
Suddenly my powder room looked more expensive. More together. Rounded corners broke up what had otherwise been sharp angles poking through every design choice.
Flush with success, I was ready to dive into the next item on my list: Paint. I’ll spare you the gory details of how many sample pots graced my tiny bathroom before I landed on the perfect shade of sage (looking at you, Farrow & Ball “Vert de Terre”!™ But seriously, $300 for paint? No thank you – I found an almost identical shade at my local hardware store for a fraction of the cost), but trust me when I say that changing the wall colour alone made all the difference.
Suddenly my boring builder-basic bathroom felt refreshing and new. Pro tip for painting small spaces: Invest in the prep work. Nail holes, texture bumps, you name it – I spent an entire Saturday sanding down every imperfection before painting.
It was worth the time. Not only did my paint job look like a professional did it, but all of the flaws I’d somehow lived with for two years were no more! Dome lights: out.
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Pendant light: 🙌🏼. When I realised how easy it was to swap out my outdated ceiling fixture (literally five minutes with a screwdriver), I was shocked I hadn’t done it sooner. All those glossy Pinterest posts had me thinking I needed to hire an electrician for such a small update.
Not the case! For any bulbs/fixtures that aren’t hardwired into your electrical system (and please do turn off the power from your breaker before trying this DIY at home 👀), swapping out a light is as simple as unscrewing the old one and screwing in the new. I scored this stunning brass light with white glass shade at a local lighting shop that was going out of business. £30, down from £90.
You just can’t beat that kind of deal. The warm glow from the bulb truly changed how the green paint looked on the wall, bringing out richness that flat white bulbs just can’t achieve. Not to mention, the pendant style allowed for more visual space around my new mirror, giving the illusion of more room.
Storage is always tricky when working with tiny bathrooms. While I’m all for hidden storage behind fancy closet doors, when it came to under-sink storage and countertop clutter, I was stumped. My bathroom feels full of trick-or-treat crap thanks to toothpaste tubes, bar soap, extra toilet paper, q-tips, and every other bathroom item I could think of.
Enter: Floating shelves. Most people lean into the shelving, using decorative boxes or bins to create the illusion of hidden storage. I did the exact opposite and painted my floating shelves the same colour as my walls, allowing them to basically disappear against the green paint.
They’re the perfect spot to stash extra toilet paper or that overpriced hand soap I can never resist buying. It might seem like a silly add-on, but upgrading my dull grey towel rail to a small heated ladder towel rack in brushed brass was life-changing. At about £80 compared to the £15 I would have spent on a standard towel rail, it was definitely a splurge.
But drying your towels with gentle heat and storing them in style is basically worth the price alone. As an added bonus, bonus shower plants: Buy one! My bathroom may not have windows, but that doesn’t mean it can’t welcome a little plant life.
I found these gorgeous cascading pothos that thrive on humidity and low light and hung one from the ceiling in a decorative ceramic pot.
It not only brings more life into the space, but the echo green of the leaves and paint bring cohesion to the room. To say that this bathroom remodel was a labour of love is an understatement.
It took me roughly three weekends (spread out over about a month – I have a day job, y’all) and cost me about £300. But not once. Moral of the story: Paint upgrades, light fixtures, and mirrors can trick you into thinking more time/pennies were splashed than actually were.
Asking prying questions about how much a DIY swap cost will get you VERY few friends, I promise. The best part about revamping my bathroom wasn’t how good it looks (though, wow, does it look good), but how much more I actually enjoy spending time in there. I used to rush through my beauty routine and escape back into the bedroom as fast as humanly possible.
Now? I kind of love spending time in there. Who knew?
