Marble Bathroom Renovation

As you peruse around the house, feel free to use either the guest bathroom or our master bathroom! This is something I have never let guests do, but now that we completed our marble master bath renovation, you are welcome to use it!

If you are like me, who loves a good before/after comparison, please enjoy these of our master bath. As mentioned our home is 36 years old and I am fairly confident everything in the bathroom was original. We did stumble upon two layers of wallpaper, but neither one was an improvement. This was a big job but doable. We opted to have a couple contractors assist because of our schedule, but also with the help of my parents, we were able to do a large portion of different steps ourselves.  The industry says a bathroom reno is between $10,000-$15,000…ours was way under this amount as we found marble on clearance, we did some work ourselves and we tried to find products on sale.  We also got several quotes- ones for doing the whole thing and ones for a la carte, if you will.  So that is what we decided.  We had the shower done first, then made progress, then had another contractor do the floor. If you are thinking of redoing your bathroom, go for it! There are so many materials and price points for every budget. Let me give you an insight into our experience! We lived with this bathroom for 3 years. It’s the kind where you clean and scrub and still can’t get the floor or tile perfectly spotless. There were also several cracks and crevasses I was 99% sure mold was flourishing behind. So after having a baby and watching her play in the water on this shower floor, my mother bear instinct kicked in and redoing the bathroom became the top priority. I just couldn’t handle it anymore!

My vision had changed throughout. I went into it with ideas but mostly an open mind because I didn’t know the cost of materials and I knew that was going to really be a determining factor in how it turned out. For example, I wanted a solid concrete shower floor and shower. No tile, no grout. Just a beautiful clean concrete industrial look. I know they do countertops like that and I had seen photos on Houzz of showers. So I got a quote. It came to about $9,000- just for that specific shower. Sooooo…I changed my mind. Long story short, I found Sahara Carrara Marble on clearance at Floor and Decor for $3.48 sq.ft! I bought enough for the shower, grout and sealer. Our roofer, come to find out also does bathrooms and because of our crazy schedule, we opted for him to do the shower portion. Luckily there was not any mold behind the tile. Everything was handled and finished timely. So mission 1 complete…a new shower! Once the shower was done, I of course started using it despite the rest of the bathroom having the old tile and vanity. Tony and I knew we wanted to do some of the work ourselves, so that’s why we segmented the project a bit. My parents came into town and we took the toilet out…very easy. We also took the tile out…pretty easy too! We found a chisel worked best and then for the stuck mortar we used a chipper machine. Gets pretty dusty and loud, but did the trick. We also took out the old vanity and wall partition. I left the large medicine cabinet in at this point. I had a hard time matching or deciding on a bathroom tile that complemented the shower tile. Because marble is natural, the grain look is so unique. Can be difficult to find something else that goes well with it so it took me a while to figure it out. I think it is best to do something contrasting rather than matching. But because the flooring also goes into our bedroom, Husband preferred something not dark that would go with the cream carpet it meets up with. So hardwood and slate were out for us. I knew we were getting two countertops from a granite supplier and opted to go with his Snow White Marble…that’s the Disney Princess in me I guess. So we ended up with a marble bathroom without exactly intending it to be. It sure is a beauty though. The floors and my granite vanity top and guest bathroom vanity top are from Supreme in Orlando. Next steps included removing the double medicine cabinet, Tony put in new drywall and smaller medicine cabinet. As luck would have it The Home Improvement Warehouse opened in Orlando and we were able to purchase our vanity with Carrara marble top, single medicine cabinet, light and guest bathroom vessel sink. If there is one in your area, I highly suggest checking it out. We decided not to go with a glass shower door. We have hard water and the spots would eventually ruin the door so I decided to get a double tension rod made for showers and that is what we are using. I have a decorative curtain in the front and a shower curtain on the back rod. I hope you like it! Please comment if you want to know where I got a certain item. Follow me on Instagram @ahostofthings for daily posts and behind the scenes photos!