In the final part of this 3-part style guide, Helen Skelton and our creative team explain how young adults and first-time buyers can “Get the Look”, with a sleek, contemporary bathroom.
No matter whether you’re taking the first step on the property ladder or making a little piece of your family home your own, we all want a bathroom that reflects our own personal tastes and preferences. Somewhere we can retreat to when we need to unwind and de-stress after a long, hard day or somewhere to invigorate and inspire, first thing in the morning.
Helen Skelton, along with our creative interior design team here at Victoria Plum, are on hand to bring you all the ideas you need and show you where you can save money too.
As this is a 3-part style guide, we’d highly recommend starting with Part 1 and working your way through from there. You can do this by clicking below.
In Part 3, we’ve come up with a look that is both simple and sophisticated, with more masculine elements. Featuring sleek, contemporary products and a monochromatic colour scheme, this bathroom has been designed specifically with young people in mind.
In this style guide, we’ll show you how to get the look in a small space and demonstrate how you can save cash by doing certain tasks yourself.
Helen and I, bringing all our bathroom ideas to life
Get the Look: Sleek and Contemporary
Pared-back minimalism is the name of the game with this bathroom design. Featuring a wet room-style walk in shower and strategically-placed storage, this space is both fun and functional.
The monochrome palette helps keep this bathroom light and uplifting, while contemporary products throughout keep lines streamlined and sleek, for on-trend appeal.
We’ve picked out colour here and there, not least through the use of a bold chequerboard floor and the indigo vanity unit, but have done this sparingly.
One thing we’ve also had to do is adapt the layout to fit with the slanted roof, which is a common feature of many urban flats and loft conversions.
Sleek, contemporary and sophisticated—be inspired by this beautiful bathroom
Some of the main things we’ve considered when designing this bathroom include:
- Plenty of storage space for all your essentials, including grooming products, soap, shower gel, etc.
- Handy shelving, both in the shower area and around the perimeter of the room, through the use of half-height false walls
- An oversized mirror, complete with LED and demister—ready to use, whenever you need it
- Baskets and boxes for dirty laundry, towel storage and cleaning products
- An assortment of plants to improve air quality and bring a touch of the outdoors in
Styling your bathroom
To get a really good feel for the colours, patterns, materials and textures, a mood board is certainly the way to go…
Get a feel for your chosen style with your own bathroom mood board
As you can see, this is a monochrome palette with a good mix of light and dark shades. We’ve introduced both graphical and textural intrigue with herringbone pattern tiles and an on-trend chequerboard floor.
All products are contemporary in style, characterised by clean lines, gentle curves and simple shapes. The indigo vanity unit adds a pop of colour in what is a very simple yet sophisticated collection.
Next, let’s take a closer look at exactly which products we’ve used and find out where you could save money by doing certain tasks yourself.
Creative walls and floors
Choosing the right wall and floor coverings is key to unlocking this bathroom’s potential. For a clean, contemporary look, we’ve opted for light shades of white and grey, in keeping with the monochromatic theme.
To provide some textural variation, we’ve opted for metro tiles in a herringbone pattern, and this is where you can get creative too. Check out our guide to using metro tiles in unusual ways for more clever tiling ideas.
Tiling is a great task to get your teeth into and, if you can do this yourself, it’ll go some way to cutting your bathroom installation costs. Take a look at our complete guide to bathroom tiling, to find out how.
Tiling the bathroom yourself is a great way to cut costs
If you aren’t careful, a monochrome colour palette can feel a little sterile and unimaginative, which is why we’ve gone big and bold with a chequerboard floor. This feature, which is one of our big bathroom tile trends, immediately draws the eye downwards, making the footprint seem much bigger than it is—a tried and tested trick for small spaces.
A mood board, containing all your favourite colours, patterns and textures, is a great way to visualise how your walls and floors will look
Finally, for an opulent, luxurious look, we’ve decorated the lower half of the remaining walls with white, marble-effect, large-format tiles, with contrasting black-tiled shelving for additional storage space.
Sleek, tactile storage
With that lovely chequerboard floor in place, the last thing you’d want to do is hide it from view! That’s why we’ve picked wall hung storage that complements this feature to perfection.
Vanity units are a great choice for modern bathrooms, adding much-needed storage in what is often an unused space. Our chosen unit adds accent colour into the mix, along with an intriguing tactile surface. Of course, you can always go for a black or grey vanity unit, but the textural variation helps to break up flat surfaces.
Keep your floor space clear with a wall hung vanity unit
The advantages that a vanity unit offers versus a simple pedestal basin are obvious. With a spacious drawer, there’s plenty of room for all your grooming products, freeing up space in other parts of your home.
Up your storage game and free up drawers and cupboards elsewhere in your home
To elevate your space, waterfall taps are one of the most popular choices for contemporary bathrooms. There’s something soothing about watching water cascading from an open spout, and it’s a great way to bring that high-end spa feel to your own home.
For a truly Zen experience, choose a calming yet contemporary waterfall mixer tap
We used the following products:
Using your wall space effectively
With a small bathroom, you need to think creatively about how you use your wall space. In this bathroom, we’ve created half-height false walls on both sides. This has allowed us to fit a wall hung toilet, which adds to the sleek appearance and keeps the floor space free. With fewer exposed parts (like the cistern or plumbing), it’s much quicker and easier to clean—a really nice added bonus!
Keep the sleek, stylish vibe going with a wall hung toilet
Where floor space is at a premium, it’s often better to think vertically than horizontally, which is where our next piece of space-saving furniture comes into play. With a tall, slimline unit, you can easily store all those larger, bulkier items that would otherwise not fit into drawers. Think of all those items you’d rather keep hidden from view, like your toilet brush for starters, which now have somewhere to live!
This tall storage unit from our Eden furniture range is the “height” of sophistication
And, it’s not just storage where you can do a bit of blue sky thinking… Vertical radiators are perfect for smaller bathrooms like this one.
Much like with the vanity unit, we’ve added a pop of accent colour with this contemporary radiator in a subtle shade of indigo.
Keep things feeling cosy with this stylish vertical radiator
We used the following products:
Showering perfection
For those who are constantly on the go (and I’ll assume that means you!), a walk in shower is absolutely ideal. With quick, level access, no restrictive doors to contend with, plus easy-clean surfaces, what’s there not to like?
Doesn’t this look inviting? Create a showering space that makes you want to get up in the mornings
One of the main things you’ll need to consider when creating your showering area is how to keep items like shampoo, conditioner, shower gel and the like, within easy reach. One quick and simple way to do this is to fit a shelf at a comfortable height. This can be used to store the odd plant, to bring an organic touch to your bathroom. Just make sure your shelf doesn’t cause any type of obstruction, which might restrict the enjoyment of your shower.
Keep toiletries close at hand with a simple shelf
Fitting things like shelving and wall hung storage is certainly something you can do yourself to reduce costs. If you aren’t that confident, take a look at our step-by-step video showing you how to drill through tiles without cracking them.
We used the following products:
- Mode Slim round stainless steel 200mm shower head and ceiling arm
- Mode Harrison square twin thermostatic shower valve with diverter and handset
- Mode 8mm wet room right handed glass panel
- Accents Mono grey 600mm bathroom shelf
Adding the finishing touches
Once you have all your main fixtures and fittings in place, it’s time for the real fun to begin! Accessories add the final finishing flourishes to your bathroom, transforming a bare space into something more personal.
Your bathroom mirror is one of the first things you should consider when designing your space. It serves multiple purposes, from providing a place to check your appearance to reflecting light and creating the illusion of space.
Bathroom mirrors offer so much more in terms of functionality these days and we’ve opted for an oversized mirror to make the very most of the natural light flooding in through the skylights. This one comes with LEDs for task lighting and a demister, so you can use it immediately after emerging from the shower, no matter how hot and steamy your room may get! Plus, as an added bonus, Bluetooth connectivity means you can sing your favourite shower-time songs any time you like!
Make sure your bathroom accessories reflect your own personality
To really stamp your own personality on this space, why not create your own artwork? After all, something you created yourself will mean far more than some expensive, generic prints.
Moving from artwork to hard work, it can be difficult to keep on top of your washing routine, especially if you’re striking out on your own for the first time. To keep this in check, a laundry basket will make a handy addition to your bathroom, giving your used towels and clothing somewhere to go and reducing clutter.
Another great way to save time and effort is to keep a small basket of cleaning products handy. This will encourage you to keep your bathroom fresh and sparkling at all times.
Just remember to choose (or even make) baskets that fit with your general colour scheme.
Keep your bathroom (and your life!) organised with a laundry basket
Choosing the right toothbrush holder or soap dispenser may seem trivial, but these are just as important as the other accessories in your bathroom. Pick out a coordinated set that includes all the essentials and make sure the colour, style and even the material, complement your palette.
The devil is in the detail… Choosing the right accessories will help to bring your bathroom to life
Finally, plant life is something any good bathroom should never be without. If you don’t have green fingers, there are plenty of succulents and hardy plants that are suited to bathrooms. For inspiration, check out our chart below.
We used the following products:
Get the Look in a small bathroom or cloakroom
Wondering how this look might work in an even smaller space, like a downstairs cloakroom? Well, we’ve already thought of that…
Many of the main features included in the main bathroom have been retained, like the wall hung vanity unit and toilet, helping to bring focus to the fabulous feature floor. However, in this instance, we’ve gone for half-height tiling around all four walls and a horizontal radiator which fits the room layout better. There’s still enough storage space for your needs, plus plenty of plant life for a more organic feel.
Use your creativity to create a small cloakroom that’s big on style
Discover more big ideas for downstairs cloakrooms in our inspirational blog post.
Finding your style: Bathroom ideas for young people—Parts 1 and 2
We hope you’ve been inspired to #GetTheLook! If you haven’t done so already, why not read Parts 1 and 2 by clicking on the images below?
#GetTheLook and #VPShareYourStyle
Are you on the hunt for bathroom inspiration? If so, you’ll be glad to hear the search is over. Discover all our style guides, from timeless to contemporary, and #GetTheLook you love. Simply click below to browse them all.
Once you’ve created your dream bathroom, share it with us and our style-seeking community on Instagram or X) (formerly Twitter), using the hashtag #VPShareYourStyle.
Why not check out our customers’ creative bathrooms today?
More bathroom ideas from Helen Skelton
When she’s not running around after her 4 children or presenting on TV, Helen Skelton understands the importance of a functional and stylish bathroom. See her other #GetTheLook style guides for inspiration.
