The chip felt velvety smooth in my hands – a gentle dove grey. Online it’d looked one way, but in the harsh, buzzing fluorescent lights of Wickes it appeared…different. Was this going to be the calming spa vibe I was going for, or was my bathroom going to end up looking like a morgue?
I was stood in the paint aisle of Wickes on a Tuesday morning, third coffee in hand, wondering if I’d made a huge mistake with my life choice. This was two years ago. Fast-forward to today and I can confidently say that painting my bathroom grey was one of the best decisions I’ve made in recent memory.
Okay, disclaimer: grey wasn’t always my top paint colour choice. My ideal bathroom was somewhere deep in Sherwood Forest, or dunked beneath the Mariana Trench.
In other words: green.
Or blue. But having remodelled my bathroom twice before (once successfully, once by setting fire to the bathtub*) I realised that colours you THINK you want aren’t necessarily colours you want to live with day in, day out. Green can look too dull depending on your lighting.
Blue will highlight watermarks. But grey? Trust me.
You’ll notice once you start diving into greys that there isn’t just one shade. There are warm greys, cool greys, greys with brown or red undertones, greys with blue or purple undertones. The subtle differences between them aren’ticable until you really start looking but once you do you’ll never not see them.
For my bathroom, I’d say the overall finish is “layered grey”. That’s a bit of a fancier way of saying that I painted the walls grey, tiled the floor with darker grey slate, and painted my vanity unit grey-blue. Walls: I used Farrow & Ball Pavilion Grey; full disclosure, I splashed out on the good stuff.
It doesn’t seem to matter what brand you go for, “mid-range” bathroom paint is never as good as the expensive stuff. And while F&B might be overkill for your bathroom walls, trust me when I say that sometimes the £40 tub of paint is worth every penny. Pavilion Grey is a greige; both warm and cool depending on where you stand and what’s going on around it.
Floor tiles: darker grey slate with a subtle texture that isn’t too slippy but doesn’t show soap scum like smooth tiles do. Vanaty unit: I painted this myself in a grey-blue colour I mixed myself. I went and bought three different grey/blue sample pots from Wilko, B&Q and Farrow & Ball; brought them home and mixed them until I liked the colour.
You definitely need white towels if you’re going all-in with grey; everything pops so much more against it! One tip I wish I’d been told before I jumped in with both feet? Grey hides nothing and everything at the same time.
Watermarks on grey tiles just sort of blend in. Dirt on grey doesn’t mock you like it does on white. Yet for some reason, white towels and chrome shower rails JUST POP against a grey background.
My main mistake the first time round was that I matched too many shades together. I chose one grey and tiled, grouted and shower curtained in different tones of that same grey. It made the whole room feel very…flat.
Like all the life had been sucked out of it. I’ve realised since that you DO need contrast when it comes to grey. Those crisp white towels I mentioned?
Non-negotiable. That brass mirror frame that reflects the bathroom wall when you’re getting ready in the mornings? Absolute gamechanger.
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Even adding a plant helped (I keep a snake plant on the bathroom windowsill – they don’t even know plants exist but they’re easy enough to look after that I don’t mind). The best thing about grey, in my opinion? It’s endlessly practical.
We have two young children who like to jump in the bath like it’s a pool and wash comes off them EVERYWHERE. Hint: navy DOES NOT hide boys’ watery handprints like grey does. Ask my friend Sarah – she has navy walls in her downstairs loo and can’t get the fingerprints off in time for guests.
Grey will also never go out of style. It’s chill. It goes with literally everything.
Yellow towels for summer? Easy. Burgundy for winter?
You got it. Psych yourself into buying a new shower curtain? Grey won’t argue.
When my mum first came to visit after moving into this house, she looked around my bathroom and said it looked “expensive”. Needless to say I snorted at her; until that grey wall, every part of this bathroom had been painfully cheap! The tiles were discounted eBay finds, the vanity was an IKEA hack that I painted myself to look halfway decent, and the mirror was from a charity shop.
But having that grey canvas made the cheap bits not LOOK cheap. Another thing to consider when painting your bathroom grey? Lighting.
I didn’t realise how much of a difference this would make until I’d already painted my walls. Warm white bulbs made my grey look dull and muddy. Like I wasn’t washing myself; I was burying myself in mud.
Daylight bulbs (about 4000K to be precise) on the other hand? Game changer. They made my grey go from boring and flat to crisp and clean.
Yeah, I spend £30 on bulbs. YES IT WAS WORTH IT. One thing I will say about grey that took me by surprise?
The colour changes depending on the time of day. Sleeeeepy morning me looks at my bathroom walls and thinks they’re lavender.
Zoom meetings at my desk?
More taupe. Natural lighting vs LED spotlight? Completely different.
If I had one piece of advice it would be this: when you’re ordering your grey paint, get samples. BIG samples. Paint them on your wall.
Look at them at different times of day. Live with them for a week. Because while grey might seem like a boring, safe option; the wrong shade of grey can make your bathroom feel cold, orclinical.
But you get the right shade? It’s like wrapping your bathroom in cashmere. *Don’t ask.
