Au revoir Paris – Welcome Cottage Chique

With the master bath renovation complete, and knowing how much we love it, we decided to attack the guest bath.  The guest bath has the same set of challenges the master: dingy floors, textured walls, dated lighting.  However unlike the master, this project was fully scoped prior to getting started. We searched Pinterest for hours and finally came up with a plan that we both liked.  The plan includes 8 main steps, bulleted below.  Fortunately we just did most of this, so we know what each step requires and the challenges that come with it.

• Replace old floors with updated tile
• Replace wall mounted light with new ceiling fixture
• Panel walls
• Add Crown Moulding
• Install new mirror
• Construct mirror frame
• Re apply base boards
• Remove shower surround and replace with subway tile

For this project, the hardest part will be the same as the master: removing the tile adhesive from the gyp-crete sub flooring.  Any contractor will tell you that installing tile on gyp-crete is a big mistake.  I have to agree as it is extremely time-consuming and labor intensive to remove.  Apparently this was not a concern of the 1976 builders of the condo.

We got the tile pulled up last night in about an hour – that’s the easy part.  What’s left is the adhesive that stayed on the sub-floor rather than coming up with the tile.  This will be removed one inch at a time with a hammer and chisel.  The effort will take the majority of Saturday – and both Charles and I fully expect to hit our thumb with a hammer at least 20x.  But once it is done, the project gets to the fun part.  Demo will be done, and it will be time to start re-building.

With our lessons learned form the master, we hope to have this project wrapped in 2 weeks… but we do have a few new challenges.  The paneling for the walls was not done in the last bathroom.  We did Wainscoting, but for the guest bath project the boards will need to go floor to ceiling and perfectly hug obstructions like doors and the medicine cabinet.  We will also be tiling the bath tub, and this was not required for the master.  However, we learned our lessons in wall-tiling when we did the kitchen backsplash.  Fingers crossed that this will present the same challenges, albeit on a larger scale.

Time to get to my favorite home improvement store and pick to some materials for the day:

• 30 sq feet tile – 75.00
• Tile Adhesive – 40.00
• Grout – 20.00