We live in a 108 yr old house that we bought 20 yrs ago. The first room we renovated was the only full size bathroom in the house. (we now have two) The tile wainscot was falling apart, the shower was small with sheets of vinyl on the shower walls, and there was a modern pedestal sink. I wish I could find the pictures of it before we made a few changes.
Sorry for the dark picture, could’t get this view any lighter no matter how hard I tried. It’s an easy snap and shoot kind of camera. We used bead board instead of tile for the wainscot and put in a new tile floor.
We have a beautiful old porcelain tub, extra long that was perfect for the boys bath time. I found the mirror on the curb for free, it not having sold at the end of a yard sale day.
The plumbing is very old and every plumber who did work in here always commented that they had never seen the plumbing outside of the tub.
There is not a traditional faucet. Just the flat round piece you see in this picture. The water comes out from the bottom of the plate. Nice when you had two boys playing all over the tub, nothing to hurt them.
We found an old porcelain pedestal sink under the basement stairs and used it for years until it was looking so bad we had to replace it. Friends of ours had this sink they weren’t using and gave it to us. I love it.
I found these antique wall sconces in Philadelphia and had custom shades made. They were a little expensive so when I called Paul and mentioned the price, he was in a meeting and wasn’t really listening, he was fine with it. Ha!
We enlarged the shower’s width by taking space from a closet in the room next door. Initially Paul wanted a one piece vinyl shower stall. (ugh!) We even had it on the front porch ready to be installed and he called me on the installation day and said NO…let’s use tile. Yay! But then I had to find tile quickly.
So I used standard 4″ x 4″ white tile and added a decorative band of tile. It wasn’t my first choice but it was in stock, though I had to get ONE final piece off a sample board from North Jersey. I was pleasantly surprised how nice it turned out.
This chair was my grandmothers, with a cane seat, and a Martha Stewart pillow! This is one of the ferns I brought in for the winter. It was so beautiful. I just hate indoor plants and couldn’t get rid of it. I put four more down in the basement.
So this is the boys bathroom now. I didn’t change anything when it became just theirs, so that’s why you see the toile lamp shades and pictures with flowers and cottages. And believe it or not, this is how it looks most of the time, clean! NOT like their bedrooms. Oh, and they usually don’t have a vase of tulips on the sink.
…………I do have a stupid story that goes along with the antique cast iron radiator you see under the window. You can skip this if you want. I was taking it in our little Toyata truck to get sandblasted and painted. Remember Andrew Cunanan? He killed Gianni Versace. Well he was on the loose in New Jersey, close by I think, and there was a big hunt for him. Well I’m driving along and there is a road stop ahead, cars being checked. I thought, I wonder if they are looking for Andrew Cunanan? How stupid of me. When it was my turn, I was asked to pull over to the side, my inspection sticker was out of date AND I hadn’t put the new registration OR insurance card in the truck. I knew exactly where they were in my kitchen. The officer was kind enough to just give me a ticket for the lack of insurance card. So I was lucky, I could produce it in court. ….and that’s my stupid little story.
Two Cherubs Antiques 