Bathroom Vanities - good, gooder, best?

It's finally happened, one door has come away from the fugly melamine-covered, cheap&cheerful, no scratch that, cheap&nasty, chipboard bathroom vanity cupboard.

This means I can now get into designing and building a new vanity cupboard, maybe even renovate the bathroom. YAY!:D

I've got a basic design in mind - 10" wide drawers on the sides with a 15" wide cupboard in the middle. I've even got the vanity basin purchased and stored in the front room ready for installation.

I have decided that I will not be using mdf or chipboard in any shape or form. I am quite willing to use polyurathane, epoxy or spar varnish on both sides of the benchtop. I was thinking of using a tas oak frame with a slab or laminated top and something wooden for the outside. I know movement is going to be an issue, so that will have to be built into the finalised design.

However, before I build and install the new bathroom vanity cupboard, I was wondering if anyone had any hints/tips/suggestions for me.


What height have you found to be most useable for a vanity cupboard? I'm thinking 850 to 900 mm high.

Have you ever used a bathroom vanity basin that you liked? If so, what did you like about it?

Do you think drawers (of a decent size) are more useful than cupboards?

What would your ultimate Bathroom Vanity be?


Thanks
Wendy

Vanity height needs to be 700mm to 750mm.
Can you accomodate reasonable size drawers when you take into consideration the plumbing connections?

Wendy, my recent excursion into kitchens taught me something about sinks - plumbers really don't think about them when they put them in. My MIL is quite old and has trouble bending down low, so when he was putting the trap in I asked him why it had to go on the top shelf rather than at the lower shelf. His reply was "well, because!", and then "I dunno, never really thought about it".

Anyway, we put the pipe straight through the dividing shelf and all the messy pipes underneath, which left an almost completely clear shelf for sink stuff to be stored. The plumber said he would do it that way in future as it was neater and much easier; he only needed to drill one hole as opposed to drilling the hole AND getting out the jigsaw to make a slot for the trap.

Summary - put the trap on the bottom, it gives you more room where you want it.

EDIT: I've added a pic. Note that everything on the bottom he was going to put on the top and cut away the shelf to make it all fit.

I have been looking at vanity units quite a bit and 850mm to the top surface of the all in one tops is usually the go in all the showroom displays.

Bob, why that short? :?

Ok so I'm tall and hate bending over nearly double, but there must be a good reason for that height to be a norm. No-one has ever been able to explain it to me beyond "you are a stupid female for asking let alone not realising it's a selling point", which, as far as I'm concerned is fuel for "I'm designing the vanity for me to use, not for someone to maybe use in x number of years time 'cause I am so not going to move anywhere else now I've bought this place etc etc etc".

To be honest, it's a pet hate of mine that certain people have told me that I must renovate the house for the purpose of resale, regardless of the fact that the needs of the people living in the house are differnet to some "norms", especially as we are fully intending to be in this house for many years to come. :rolleyes:



Groggy, Very good point re the trap. That explains why I've followed my instinct to put the cupboard in the middle and the drawers on the side.



I've figured that the unit can be 35 " wide which will leave enough room between the vanity and the bath i.e ~ 6" more than enough to get a hand or fist in the space for cleaning purposes.

cheers
Wendy

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Ok so I'm tall and hate bending over nearly double

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Go with your instinct Wendy, I am not height challenged and when building this house had all the benches raised 60mm above the normal maximumum, and the shower glass and the shower heads. So a shorty wont buy my house - who cares. Most people dont even notice but my back does especially at the basin and the sink. Last house was buit by a shorty and I sufferred backache if I was at home very long. My MIL who is vertically challenged copes with the benches.

Did not go the max though as wife is not as tall.

Like the suggestion by Groggy - have to file that for next time!

Like the suggestion by

HI Wendy,

Bathroom vanities - a real minefield of design options. Heh Heh!

HEIGHT - about 850 - 900 mm to the top of the rim of the basin is about right IMO.

BASIN MATERIAL - genuine porcelain or fireclay or anything vitreous will stay looking pristine much longer and wont stain and be easier to clean. BEWARE the polymarble - some popular cleaners can make it go dull and porous in a very short space of time.

WASTE OUTLETS - a popular type of waste these days is the pop up type with or without a discharge lever. I don't like them - they wont let hair, fur, little bits of grit and drowned xmas beetles go down the pipe. Far better IMO is the swivel type waste - or the plain old grated type with plug. An overflow outlet could be handy also but they are a PITA to instal.

PLUMBING - the idea about locating the trap under the bottom shelf is a good one - but why not take the trap even further and put it under the floor if you can get access down there. Another alternative is use a Wizard trap (available at bunnings) which just looks like and takes up the space of a 300mm long x 65 wide piece of pipe. These work well I've found.

DESIGN - As your making the cabinet yourself consider the types of items you want to store in it. I'd give a big yes to Deep drawers say about 300 deep and fully extendable. 300 mm is deep enough to lose all those annoying bottles of stuff that seem to clutter up the place.

You can also dispense with the center cupboard and make a drawer combo to fit around the waste pipe. I personally hate cupboards where things disappear right to the back and you have to get on your hands and knees to find them.

WALL HUNG - I am never going to have a vanity unit sitting on the floor again - maybe sitting on legs - but no plinths or kicks. It is so much easier to clean and doesnt attract cockroaches and mould. You can get chrome and brass metal covers (paint whatever color you like) to hide the waste pipe neatly.

Technical points - Timber benchtops in the bathroom need some special attention. My experiences have made me shy away from timber benchtops in general. Consideration will have to be given to the finish used as at least 2 nasty things can happen with timber vanity benchtops -

1) Silicones will lift or eat away most fresh timber finishes except acrylic or polyesther based finishes.

2) many household cleaners and disinfectants will send polyurethanes brittle and yellow and send acrylics white. This will take about 2 years to become apparent. Even some types of hand soap will mark the surface in just one incident.

In My experience the only truly reliable timber finish suitable to stand up against bathroom chemical attack is a polyesther (fibreglass or a "soft " epoxy ) finish. Running a close second in resistance is the good old turps based one pack polyurethane ( but it scratches easy).

You may have to do some research on this issue.

MY IDEAL VANITY - woo hoo! It would be long - 1800 is a good length, wall hung with just one row of 300 deep drawers right along the front, made from a real nice timber slab say Red Banksia finished in polyesther resin Cystalcoat M35 from mirotone (if they still make it). The basin would be a "waterplane" type with no waste hole. No pipes showing anywhere (waste pipe goes down between wall studs)

Under the front of the cabinet would be a metal towel rail running the full length. A box(maybe 2) made of same timber and sliding on hidden castors sits on the floor under it and is a waste bin or clothes basket.

ok time to go to bed and dream

Cheers

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Originally Posted by RufflyRustic

Ok so I'm tall and hate bending over nearly double,

Groggy, Very good point re the trap. That explains why I've followed my instinct to put the cupboard in the middle and the drawers on the side.

I've figured that the unit can be 35 " wide which will leave enough room between the vanity and the bath i.e ~ 6" more than enough to get a hand or fist in the space for cleaning purposes.

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G'Day Wendy,

NO!:no:
You are NOT Tall, well, not overly Tall.
I am accused of looking like a Camel Drinking, when I brush my Teeth at the Basin:B

Good one on the "S"" Bend:2tsup:

I am looking at having the taps out of the Wall.
Trouble is that so many [Read MOST]Vanities have the Tap holes already formed.:(

Wendy,
Go for one of the MORE Gooderer Basins,
not the Bestest,
then you don't pay TopTap Dollar:rolleyes:

Wendy an idea I saw recently was a shallow drawer just under the bench top in front of the sink to put the hair dryer and the old mans electric razor.

Just keeps it out of the way and easily stored.

It is usually a dead spot as there is not much you can put there.

Some great ideas! Thanks!

cheers
Wendy

Hey Wendy....I've got my new vanity sitting in the shed waiting to be finished. It's basically an old cast iron kitchen sink with a shallow bowl and drain board either side, sitting in a 90x45 river red gum frame about 1400 long x 430 wide and 900 high (both of us are over 6ft tall)....just a simple mortice & tenon job. Doors and end panels will be RRG frames with hoop pine ply infills..

No pictures as yet....funnily enough

The vanity in our ensuite is 2.4m long and has a continuous 'polymarble type' top.
Fantastic to clean the top surface and endless room to store and move around items when cleaning the bathroom. It would be 30+ years old and the top surface has lots of almost invisible scratches and minor grooves that do not look at all unsightly. The bowl section is a different story and has discoloured to some degree in the bottom half and has lots of hairline surface cracks(crazing) that would never be in danger of leaking even if the bowl was left full of water. They are a little untidy however and when I get around to it the ensuite will get a full face lift same as the main bathroom. I suspect all the cleaning agents and hot water have caused the discolouration and hairline crazing.

I agree with Doog I love china tops over poly marble but if you want the long length then it is ceaserstone or polymarble for my money.

I will be installing a 1200mm wall hung in my main bathroom (one day) and I am told the wall hung helps to create the illusion of width of room - or should I say having a floor mounted one in a narrow room apparently makes the room narrower looking.
That is only one reason for wall hung. I like easy floor cleaning aspect and have replaced water damaged floor mounted vanity cabinet before.

I will also consider Doog's advice on the pop up waste plugs as with the women and long hair the last thing I need is blocked outlet in the sink.
Unfortunately hard to avoid having one door with all the plumbing but all drawers would be my dream and I like the 300mm deep idea for all the hairspray cans stuff.

Just to share some thoughts on my planned vanity unit:

Ideally a single piece, continuous "synthetic marble" top, so that the sink doesn't have joints to trap dirt/mould. If that fails the "budget test", then I'd go for a sink that is recessed below the vanity top. This is to avoid any protrusion above the vanity horizon line so that water can fall in and not pond outside & behind the sink.

Some fall in the vanity top to ensure water does not pond.

Large mirror, with good lighting.

Ideally, (for young families) large enough to have space to change baby nappies to one side, and large enough beside/around the sink as well so that items (handwash liquid, etc) won't hand precariously at the edge or keep falling off. If possible, large enough to bath baby.
Tapware to NOT protrude out too much and poke baby in the face or knock the head.

Waste trap - NOT in the floor or concealed - whether high up or low down in the cabinet, it must allow access to remove and clean, AND allow a pail or tray to be inserted below it to catch any dripping water & muck. The reality of life is that some day, you will need to clear it of hair, etc, even if you use sieves at the sink. Might not necessarily be choked sinks, but slow flowing sinks miraculously clear super quick and you wonder why you didn't do it earlier.

Not exactly a related issue, but I reckon all bathrooms & toilets should have a floor trap inside, waterproofed floor & a bund or reverse fall to avoid the possibility of accidental flooding inside and worse, to the bedrooms/house.

My 2 c worth. Have fun with your vanity unit!

I like the tips here, especially Dirty Doogie's. Unfort my plumber already has the pipe a bit out from the wall, so I was thinking if I have a shallow unit (ie only one drawer high then the benchtop), maybe I could make some sort of a box around the pipe and tile it in.

I really like wall hung vanities, but I'm worried about the weight of it, I've planned for a vanity about 1500 wide with twin basins, and there will be no other support other than screwing onto the wall studs.

Should I put in some sort of L brackets or some sort of horizontal timber support bolted in first? If so, do these go directly to the studs, or is it ok to put these over the villaboard? Only reason I can think not to is that I don't want to see them, and I won't be able to tile over them.

Aesthetics vs practicality re pipe - while it's nice to see just the sink, bear in mind that if you totally box in the sink trap (the mug-shaped thingy that hangs below and which you may need to open up in a hair/muck-logged crisis), you're not going to be able to clear the blockage. Chemicals or pumps don't do half the job that clearing it does.

Others will have better advice on supports, but I definitely would not rely on the villaboards supporting the sink. Whatever suppporting brackets you put in, make sure they transfer the load onto the studs.

I just want to reiterate how much I hate pop up wastes.

I was really sick with some stomach thing yesterday and was vomitting all night - stoopid pop up wastes wont let that go down either. GRRRR!

That is y every bathroom should have a dunny.

Hope u r feeling better Doog.

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Originally Posted by Ashwood

Aesthetics vs practicality re pipe - while it's nice to see just the sink, bear in mind that if you totally box in the sink trap (the mug-shaped thingy that hangs below and which you may need to open up in a hair/muck-logged crisis), you're not going to be able to clear the blockage. Chemicals or pumps don't do half the job that clearing it does.

Others will have better advice on supports, but I definitely would not rely on the villaboards supporting the sink. Whatever suppporting brackets you put in, make sure they transfer the load onto the studs.

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Sorry yeah, guess I wasn't that clear. Wasn't talking about boxing in the trap... just the pipe until it enters the vanity unit, then the trap can be inside that. Or maybe I could use a stainless pipe and make it a feature.


As for the supports, I also must have been unclear. I didn't mean being supported only by villaboard... I was more asking whether I should have some sort of steel frame bloted to the studs, then villaboard on top (with slots for the frame), or just put the villaboard on the studs now, then have the steel frame bolted to the studs through the villaboard. Much of a muchness I guess.

we had a custom vanity made up for our house because most of the decent vanities came close to $1k and non quite suited what we wanted.

We only had 800 to play with but wanted mostly draws, losing a little space we opted for floating because we dont really like bending that much anyway and it helped make the room seem a little bigger.

Basically we have a floating vanity with 2 draws on either side which are deaper than usual so cans can stand up in them, they pull the full way out not 70%. One door compartment in the middle for hair dryers/curling/what ever the other half decides should would like to waste space with. The top is a ceaser stone with a separate semi recessed basin. The basin has an overflow valve which was a hassle to make work with a fancy popup waste, we just use an old fashion plug.

If you decide to go for the full bathroom reno look into the floating units they look very very nice and you can hide a central heating vent underneath as well, but all the pre plumbing has to be done in the wall. Otherwise the only thing i can take out of our unit is that higher & full extension draws are awesome!

I like the idea of wall mounted vanities, easy to clean under, no water damage problems to the base of your unit etc. Also recomend if you are putting mirrors above vanity to make sure it is a decent distance above it. I clean motel rooms, and our mirrors are too low, always a mess.

donna

I have to install one soon and was planning on about 250 - 300mm gap between top of vanity and the mirror bottom. What do you think?

Cheers

That sounds sufficient, you could do an experiment in your bathroom with a bit of glass or mirror to see how far the splatter goes. I dont know what some people do in front of their mirrors, must flick the toothbrush outwards from their open mouths I think, with personal competition to see how high they can splatter.

RufflyRustic,

I'm working on this vanity at the moment and thought I'd post these drawings as my design seems similar to the ideas you had. So far I'm quite happy with how it is working out as it seems that there will be quite a lot of useable space in the 6 drawers [false drawer fronts at left and right top], and all pipes etc are confined to the middle area, hidden behind the door. Height will be 900mm with a caesarstone top.

By the way, for anyone interested we got our caesarstone about $100 cheaper by using an offcut from the supplier. They get so many offcuts that they end up throwing them out, and we had a good selection to choose from.

Hi JMB,

Now that's a great idea - a ceasarstone offcut!. I like your design, in fact your design and mine follow incredibily similar lines :D

I still haven't started it yet, I know that once I do, the rest of the bathroom will have to be renovated too :( and that's going to be a big job.

Cheers
Wendy

Wendy, a couple of points..

Most vanity manufacturers have gone away from solid wood to HMR veneered board. They find they have less problems (and warranty claims). Make sure you are very careful of grain direction if jointing boards, and very, very careful with the type of finish you use.

The "Press Pop" wastes are great, you can easily unscrew the top for access for cleaning. Give them a lubricating spray every six months and they'll last for years (I've been selling them for years). I don't like the rotating ones.

Why not use all drawers, with the top draw being made to go around the waste (as already suggested)? this makes for more usable storage.

Caeserstone or similar tops with undermount basins look great and are easy to keep clean.

Cheers,

Mark