Hey friends! I’m so excited to reveal our master bathroom makeover!!! If you’ve been following the blog since we moved to Florida, you already know we bought this house even though we did not like any of the bathroom design choices. If I had an infinite budget, I would gut every bathroom in the house and start from scratch. But we’re living real life here and unfortunately, I have a limited budget, so there will be no demo happening during this master bathroom makeover! So, if you would like some great tips on how to makeover a bathroom on a budget, keep reading!
Table of Contents
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Before and after
This bathroom is such a mess!! None of the elements coordinate well with each other. The brown cabinets don’t match the granite. The shower floor has colors that match the vanity, but the style does not look good together. The square white tiles, lack of hardware, and lighting scream cheap builder-grade boring. It’s sad because you don’t have to use expensive products to get an elegant more expensive look in a bathroom. These are just terrible design choices. But never fear, we are going to completely change the look with several DIY pros
before
after
HOW TO BEGIN A MASTER BATHROOM no demo MAKEOVER
Here I go again, pretending to be an interior designer!! I have no idea how professional decorators begin a new project, but before I jump into decorating a room, I like to ask myself two questions. Once I have the answers, I move on to seven simple steps to address every area of my room. This strategy has worked wonders for me! I hope you will follow along, let’s get started!!
Two Important Questions
Do I have a decor style?
Yes, I decided to decorate the main living areas of our home in French Country style. Guess what, there is not one single part of this bathroom that looks French Country. Since I can not change the granite or the majority of tile at this time, I will be making choices that lean towards French Country. In other words, it’s not going to look like a French Country bathroom when I’m finished. I’m going to do my best to give it some French country touches of elegance!
Do I have an inspiration piece or color to work from?
My color scheme will be determined by the granite countertops and tile floor. I’ll be using white, with touches of black, and gray.
Now that I’ve answered those two questions, I have a definite direction to head in. But when a room is empty, or you want to change or update everything about it, where in the world do you begin?? I break down the room into seven zones or steps, so I don’t get overwhelmed.
SEVEN STEPS TO MAKEOVER A MASTER BATHROOM
Work through each of the following steps and before you know it, you’ll have a brand new room! I can’t wait to show you our tips and tricks that allowed us to completely makeover our master bathroom without having to demo a thing.
Window Treatments
When we first moved in, I was more concerned with covering the window for privacy than I was about style.
You see, our bathroom window is only a few feet away from our next-door neighbor’s front porch!! This is the view from our glass-enclosed shower! Needless to say, I did not want anyone to be able to see inside, so the curtains had to be lined.
Since the walls are gray, I chose a white curtain with gray embroidery. I love the design! They came from Bed, Bath, and Beyond.
WALLs
Next, let’s address the walls. Since this is a bathroom we will discuss paint color, the tile that’s on the walls, and the showerhead. Side note: I thought I would get used to these textured walls, but I really don’t like them. Not sure why they do this in Florida???
paint color
The people who built our house chose a paint upgrade, which means they paid extra to have every room in the house painted gray instead of builder-grade white. They chose the color Silverplate by Sherwin Williams. We have so many DIYs to do in this room that painting the walls was not an option at this time! So I’m learning to love Silverplate!!
wall tile
Whoever built our house must have run out of money when they got to the bathrooms because they used the cheapest builder-grade tile for the walls that is available. They chose white 4 X 4 square tiles. So boring, but at least it’s neutral and goes with everything! See how I’m making lemonade out of lemons lol!!!
showerhead-first DIY project
The shower is very large but it had a tiny builder-grade shower head. It looked quite silly with such a tiny fixture in that big space. So, you guessed it, our first DIY in the room was to change out the fixture.
This fixture was so inexpensive, and the scale of it looks so much better in the large space. We love the rain head shower and the fact that the smaller head is handheld and you can adjust the spray. Click here to learn how you can easily install a new shower head!
Lighting-second DIY project
One of the easiest ways to show your decor style in a room is with lighting! I don’t know what you think, but these lights do not evoke the casual elegance of French country. Is it just me??
I could not wait to get rid of the builder-grade vanity bar lights.
They were extremely bright and not very attractive! Now, most French country light fixtures are very ornate and fancy. I love the look, but I think they would have looked out of place in this bathroom since the tile and fixtures are so casual.
I can not afford to replace all of the chrome sink and tub fixtures, so I opted for the most elegant light fixture I could find in chrome. I wanted a shaded style with some curved features and crystal elements. These brought in the casually elegant feel I was looking for! I ordered them from Wayfair. To learn how to replace your bathroom light fixture, click here!
Floors
In this step, we’ll address the floors and the shower floor tile.
Shower floor tile-third DIY project
Did you know you can tile over the tile? Our builder told us it would be the easiest way to change the look of the room. The tile store said it was a good choice for us since the shower was in perfect working order. They said you can not do this if there is an issue with your old tile or water damage in the shower. That’s how we were able to do a no demo makeover of the master bathroom and get a completely different shower floor!
The shower tile was actually a very expensive upgrade. Unfortunately, it does not match our style at all. If this were a cabin in the woods and we had a rustic decor theme, it would be fabulous. Since that’s not the case, it had to go. So, the second DIY project became tiling over the old tile!
We chose marble mosaic tiles. It is gray and white and has a black speck that actually matches the granite countertops! It gives a more formal French feel to the room than the rustic round stones. It does not match perfectly with the floor tile but looks better than it did.
Tile floor
The gray tile floors are very basic and don’t match the new shower as well as I would have liked. The floor takes on a pink cast in certain light. Next year I might paint the floor white and add a gray stencil on top! I’m going to jot that down on my Personalize the Master bathroom printable!
I use this handy printable to help me organize and personalize every step of my home. If you would like a free copy of my printables just click HERE to sign up for our emails!
Furniture
We are going to count the bathroom cabinets as furniture. I do have one real piece of furniture in the bathroom, the chair at my vanity.
Bathroom cabinets-fourth DIY project
This is Rich’s cabinet before. I think the brown color looks terrible with the granite countertops. So our fourth DIY project was to change the look of the cabinets with paint!
Here is the after! We painted the cabinets with Sherwin Williams Pure White. Then, we added new hardware and a pretty embellishment!
Here is my side of the bathroom before.
And now the after picture! What a transformation!!
Add hardware-fifth DIY project
Our fifth DIY project was to add hardware to the cabinets and drawers. I chose chrome hardware with a more ornate shape from Wayfair.
Embellish cabinet-sixth DIY project
I added this carved wooden piece to the cabinet for a more formal French Country look. That makes DIY project number six!
Chair-seventh DIY project
The only other piece of furniture in the room is the chair in the vanity area. I wanted to paint it white and recover the seat, but I ran out of time to paint it.
I had this piece of fabric leftover from my cornhole beanbags that I made last Spring. I thought it would look better since it has gray, white and black! So I did a seventh DIY project.
mirrors/pictures
I wanted to add a decorative frame around the mirrors to dress them up. After seven other DIY projects, there’s no time or money left for that project. I’ll add it to my Personalize the Master Bath Printable and tackle it next year!
Accessories
Accessories are another great way you can inexpensively bring elements of your decor style into a room. Before I buy anything new for a space, I shop my house to see if I already have some items I can use to decorate.
I wanted to cover up an electrical outlet on my vanity so I grabbed this floral arrangement from my living room. I made it last Spring, click here to see the DIY.
These old perfume bottles look perfect in this space. They have a great deal of sentimental value, as they belonged to my great-grandmother!! I vividly remember them sitting on a small shelf in her bathroom.
I decided to grab a couple of my apothecary jars to hold items I use in the bathroom. I think they look so pretty and are very functional! The fleur-de-lis soap and dish were in my bathroom in Kentucky. I bought the gray candle holders and dried floral arrangement from AT Home on clearance.
We needed a rug to wipe our feet on and I found this beautiful one from At Home, as well.
The mirror is too far away for me to see to put on my mascara, I guess that’s typical when you’re over fifty lol!!! So, I purchased this magnifying mirror and the gorgeous glass containers from Home Goods. I took the white platter from my dining room and sat them on top, to make a pretty vignette!
Well, did you enjoy our no demo master bathroom makeover! I can’t believe we did seven DIY projects!! It was so much work, but well worth the time and effort. What do you think? Did I capture a little bit of a French country feeling?? Let me know in the comments below!!
more decorating makeover inspiration
- Eat-in Kitchen Makeover
- How to Makeover a Bedroom into a Rustic Retreat
- Beautiful French Country Inspired Makeover
more DIY makeover inspiration
Blessings, Donna and Rich
**Some of the links in this post are affiliate links. This means if you click on the link and purchase the item, we will receive an affiliate commission at no extra cost to you. We appreciate your support. (disclosure policy)
So many really nice touches!
Thanks a lot, I think it looks so much better! Donna