<p>Handicap bath or shower, sink and toilet in same room. Walls and floor made from acrylic. Everything can be hosed down to floor drain.</p>
<p>Echoing BunsenBurner, I’m a big fan of expoxy grout with one caveat. The material is much more expensive, and I would only use a tile contractor familiar and adept in working with it. It is unforgiving in mixing, application, and cleanup, but properly applied will last forever.</p>
<p>I’m also a fan of full tile all the way up ALL the wet walls, including the ceiling in an enclosed tub or shower installation. Makes cleaning far easier, and eliminates most paint or mildew issues in those areas.</p>
<p>As for the wall mounted toilet, they make floor cleaning easier, but beware reroughing for plumbing, which can get expensive.</p>
<p>anxiousmom- I don’t have glass block in my shower but my husband is a builder and has used it plenty of times. We have not had any complaints. I think it looks nice. It gives light but provides privacy.
Tango- we have glass sliding doors in all the tubs in our house except the master bath which is a separate shower with a glass door. One of the kids sliding door leaks. Between my husband and our plumber they can not figure out how to fix it. It has ruined the drywall and leaked down into our utility room. I am ready to rip it out. I don’t know if a curtain would be any better. Luckily the shower is only used by the away at college kid so the walls are all dry except at holiday time. At some point I need to have the drywall done and a painter come in.
One problem I have in my master shower is that the ceilings are high. The shower is entirely tiled including the ceiling. I get mildew growing up on the top. It is to high to reach with a step stool. I tried spraying with mold and mildew cleaner but it only gets some of it. There is no way to get water up that high unless you get a ladder and carry up a bucket.<br>
As far as purchasing fixtures or tile. Often the tile setter or plumber get a better price then the consumer. Once you know what you want you might have them price it out for you. Though now I think many of them just go out to Home Depot. Also we have found that sometimes the tile setter has tile leftover from another job that he can sell you cheap. It works best if you have a small space. Or sometimes they have plenty due to a customer changing the tile after it has already been ordered. ( I never got the luxury of deciding I didn’t like something after I ordered it. My builder husband was strict with me- No change orders! Cost to much money.</p>
<p>I’ve seen glass shower doors on hinges that only cover about half the tub, you might like them better. Like this: [Glasss.com</a> — Shower Door Photos](<a href=“http://www.glasss.com/Numbered/1116.htm]Glasss.com”>http://www.glasss.com/Numbered/1116.htm) You could lower the ceiling in the shower area so it’s like an alcove, if reaching the ceiling to clean it is a problem. I agree tiling the ceiling is a good idea. </p>
<p>I once tiled an entire bathroom floor from the rejects from another job. (Incredibly picky client.) It was marble tiles I could never have afforded otherwise.</p>
<p>Solar tubes really are miraculous, though they aren’t as pretty as skylights. I used them on an interior corridor a few years back. You are right you can get a transluscent glass so your neighbors can’t see in. They also make films you can put on the glass. <a href=“http://www.decorativefilm.com/index.asp?c=28229[/url]”>http://www.decorativefilm.com/index.asp?c=28229</a></p>
<p>I love tubs and replaced my shower with a tub when I remodeled the master bath. If you like jetted tubs, there is huge difference among them. I chose a Pearl whirlpool that has a true whirlpool action - only two jets but they are strong and the force is more massage-like than irritating like many of the lower end brands. I got my fixtures through the plumbing supply company that supplied the tub. I was told at some point that,even though the name is the same, companies make lower end product for places like Lowes and Home Depot - does anyone know if this is true?</p>
<p>Re: Shower Doors. I don’t know if you have enough room but I’ve seen a few showers that are set deeply enough that no water splashes out, or that are set behind a glass block wall so the water is contained. I’m not describing this well. Have a picture: [Homeowners</a> - Shower Systems Walk In](<a href=“http://www.pittsburghcorning.com/homeowners/ss_walkin.asp]Homeowners”>http://www.pittsburghcorning.com/homeowners/ss_walkin.asp)</p>
<p>I’ve also seen them done without a step so that you could roll in a wheelchair or make it accessible for other disabled people…even temporarily disabled.</p>
<p>ucla dad, was that toilet difficult to install?</p>
<p>Just a word to you tubby folks -</p>
<p>my elderly mother slipped while getting out of her tub recently, so I’d also look into some sort of railing or the ability to add rails or a grab bar (which is what she was able to do). With the cost of tuition and decreasing home values, we’ll be using these tubs for a good long while, so may as well make them safe for your dotage.</p>
<p>I have a friend who is in the business of retro-fitting houses so elderly people can live in them longer without needing to go into a home. It’s amazing how just a few, relatively inexpensive changes can make an increasingly difficult to manage house livable again. So many people just roll over and die when they are forced to leave their homes because they cannot manage alone.</p>
<p>Even if you don’t put in grab bars, it’s worth it to ask the contractor to put in some blocking for future grab bars. It costs nothing, you just have to remember where the blocking is!</p>
<p>I am turning into a green eyed monster reading this thread. We only have one tub and the bottom broke out a while back and e can’t afford to replace it right now (can afford the tub - it’s the labor we can’t. Not sure we are up to installing t ourselves). I have not had a bath in ages (don’t worry - we do have a shower). I really miss soaking in the tub. Helps with the arthritis too. Sigh. One of these days.</p>
<p>violadad, next time you need epoxy grout installed - call me! H and I are epoxy grout DIY pros! I have never grouted anything before in my entire life, but I found that working with epoxy grout was not a big deal (may be because hub and I had already made an epoxy-fiberglass Koi pond in our backyard?).</p>
<p>OP, another very nice-to-have thing is heated bath towel bars.</p>
<p>swimcatsmom, don’t be sad: heated floors, towel bars, granite etc. are only in my dreams. I do have the epoxy grout though!</p>
<p>I’ve seen the bath doors that mathmom linked to above in hotel rooms (just think, those cleaning people have to clean those bath/showers every day, so it makes sense to have something that makes the cleaning more efficient), and it’s the only way I would go if I had to have a glass door again.</p>
<p>In our master, we have a soaking tub and separate shower. The shower enclosure is very tiny, and I have been wanting to redo the shower for a couple of years. Problem is, to put in a larger drain pan, we would run into the area where one of the vents comes out of the floor. But I also absolutely LOVE the theory behind the shower novelisto linked. No door at all on the shower.</p>
<p>One piece of advice. If you are going to replace the tub with a soaker (it’s what I have, because I love taking baths), think twice about making it a whirlpool. I decided against it because I like adding oils to my bathwater, and you can’t do that with jetted tubs.</p>
<p>teriwitt - you can add the oil after the jets are off. I often do that - use the whirlpool for a certain amount of time and then add oils or salts and soak. If anyone has arthritis or aches and pains, there is nothing that I have found that helps more than the whirlpool.</p>
<p>I was against jets when the builder wanted to put a jetted tub in our house. Just the thoughts of bacteria and soap scum lodged in them made my skin crawl.</p>
<p>For shower doors, avoid sliders. Swing-open doors are much easier to clean.</p>
<p>Bunsen, personally I don’t have issues using epoxy grout, but is definately not a product I would trust in the hands of a neophyte d-ii-y’er or even an inexperienced “pro”. The mixing parameters and set times are much tighter than cement based grouts. I’ve seen a few “pro” jobs with bad color matches between mixed grout batches amd/or virtually impossible to remove residual grout staining on the tiles due to bad in process cleanup. Just a warning for those contemplating epoxy.</p>
<p>I designed a walk in shower for the house I designed for my parents. It was probably their favorite thing about the house. It always surprised me how much they liked it. They’d seen the arrangement in a hotel in Italy. If I ever do my mythical master bath, I’ll have one too. :)</p>
<p>Great, ya’ll, I 'd like more pros and cons of jetted tubs. Our remodeler said that if we were at all concerned about resale (and we are, this isn’t our retirement house), that we would need to put in a jetted tub, it was expected in our area - a RE agent friend confirmed the same thing, not a deal killer, but something people would definitely notice.
Personally, I could live without the jetted tub, I just want lots of hot water.</p>
<p>We put in a tankless water heater on the other hot water circuit - our house had two medium water heaters instead of one big one. I have mixed opinions about the tankless water heater, if anyone is interested. We are probably going to go tankless on the master bath side of the house when we do the renovation, i think it will play to the strengths of the tankless system.</p>
<p>heated floors sound wonderful, but we live in Mobile, so that’s a luxury we can forgo, mostly we’re glad the floor is cold ;). </p>
<p>I hope light and ventilation will help the mildew, but this is an all out war - I’m not sure you guys who are not from the deep South really appreciate this mildew, this is the kind of fungus that stars in horror movies! we’re attacking it on all fronts - over ventilation, I hope i can find a vent with an automatic shut off, and train DH to use it, natural light, epoxy grout or grout treated with anti- mildew agents, a Kerdi shower(anyone got one of those??), and the final weapon in my arsenal - the grout on the shower floor and the lower part of the shower will be a darker color (mildew stain color) than the rest of the grout! Antmore mildew fighting suggestions?</p>
<p>There are bathroom vents that go on automatically and don’t shut off until the air has reached a certain humidity. That might work for you. Make sure that the backer boards you use are mildew resistant and cement board in any area exposed to water.</p>