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Better Baths

A pair of 1950s bathrooms go from “pretty awful” to awfully pretty with environmentally friendly remodeling.

Design/Green Consultant: William Craig
General Contractor: Wilkinson Design & construction, Inc.
Text: Tim Wood
Professional Photography: Patrick Wiseman

The two unremarkable bathrooms at opposite ends of a 1950s era home in Orleans were referred to by the owners as “funky ’50s” and “Motel 6,” respectively. “The bathrooms were pretty awful,” says one. The walls were green, the vanities blue, and fixtures antiquated. Neither room had any character.

When the couple decided to remodel several rooms in the house, including the two bathrooms, they wanted the work, and the finished products, to be as environmentally friendly as possible. Approaching the design from a “green” perspective meant concentrating on durable, environmentally friendly materials with high recycled content, says William Craig, a Philadelphia architect and the son of the owners. He designed the new bathrooms, working with Pav Wilkinson of Wilkinson Design & Construction in Harwich and Foreman and Master Carpenter Cregg Sweeney of Orleans.

Water is an important element in the bathroom, of course, and given the Cape’s sole-source aquifer, being kind to groundwater was important to the owners. Plumbing fixtures, therefore, had to adhere to strict water-conservation criteria. Natural light needed to be maximized, and good ventilation was necessary to prolong the life of all the materials and prevent mold and mildew growth—always an issue on the Cape.

The first step, says Wilkinson, was gutting the two rooms to the studs. The rooms were similar in size—45 and 53 square feet, respectively—and the remodeled spaces stayed pretty much within the original footprint, although the size of one bathroom was increased slightly.

Some structural problems had to be dealt with first. There was some rot around the toilet and much of the framing was substandard, Sweeney recalls. There were even two layers of tile in one of the bathrooms, probably the result of what he calls a “homeowner’s special.”

The rooms were reframed and the walls “trued up,” adds Wilkinson. All of the old plumbing was removed and updated to meet current codes.

One of the bathrooms had a window providing natural light, but the second bathroom had no exterior exposure. It was “probably the most horrendous room in the house,” says Craig.

To get at least some natural light into the second bathroom, a solar tube, a kind of tubular skylight, was removed from the kitchen of the house, which was also being remodeled, and installed over the shower. Consisting of long aluminum reflecting tubes that run from a plastic bubble on the roof to the bathroom ceilings, solar tubes are a good “green” solution when conventional skylights are not practical. They cast a mellow, even light and have other benefits, Craig says: They are more leak-proof than regular skylights and cost a lot less.

It’s a feature that the owners like. “It adds so much more light,” says one. Combined with glass shower doors, the solar tube “punches light right out into the room,” Sweeney says.

The tubular skylight is the one element that distinguishes the two bathrooms. They share other features, beginning with new Marmoleum floors, a type of linoleum made from natural materials with no VOCs or toxic chemicals. Marmoleum also has strong antibacterial properties and is extremely easy to clean, making it perfect for bathroom use, says Craig. “And it looks good,” he adds.

Trim along the walls, baseboards, windows and the built-in cabinets is composed of “plyboo,” a bamboo plywood that has the benefit of being made from one of the world’s most sustainable and durable materials. There’s also a lightness to the bamboo that helps boost the brightness of the bathroom. Sweeney says the material was surprisingly easy to work with. “That was something I hadn’t worked with before. It was a really neat material, really stable.”

Most homes now use low-flush toilets, calling for fewer than two gallons per flush, compared to the five or so gallons per flush of older toilets. But for this remodel, Craig used the Caroma Caravalle dual-flush toilet, which uses either 1.6 gallons or eight-tenths of a gallon per flush, whichever is appropriate. The commodes are sleek and stylish, but also pricey, costing about $400 each.

The shower stalls were slightly enlarged and lined with Terra Green ceramic tiles. Manufactured in Indiana, they’re certified to have at least 55 percent recycled glass content and meet LEED building criteria.

Sticking with the recycling theme, the vanity countertops, which sit on stainless steel tube legs designed by Craig, are composed of a material called IceStone, made by a New York company out of concrete and recycled glass. By recycling glass from New York City, the product, which meets LEED criteria, both reduces the solid waste stream and provides a surface that is as durable and attractive as quarried stone.

The vanity and shower fixtures are manufactured by Grohe and use a low-flow aerator that can cut water use to as low as one-half gallon per minute, Craig says, as opposed to the two gallons per minute of conventional faucets. All of the lighting fixtures are outfitted with low-energy CFL bulbs. Energy Star-rated Panasonic WhisperGreen ceiling-mounted fans provide the exhaust necessary to keep the rooms mildew-free in the damp Cape Cod environment, especially in the windowless bathroom.

The owners are pleased with the final product. After seeing the initial plans, they had expected to have less storage space, but the built-ins took care of that. “The redesign made a lot more efficient use of the space available and made it a lot more comfortable and inviting,” says one of the owners. “Plus we now have roomier showers.”

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