On just about every homeowners wish list is an en suite bathroom to their master bedroom. Convenient and functional, en suites serve a purpose to help facilitate busy lives as well as offering much needed privacy in family homes. However, the role of the bathroom is changing. The rise of social media and a dedicated trend for lavish bathroom interiors has meant that bathrooms now need to combine functionality with stunning finishes and aesthetics.
This has been helped with an explosion of new sanitary ware, brassware and the resurrection of coloured ceramics. Showstoppers in their own right, these new products have helped bathrooms cement their place as one of the most desirable rooms in the house and have also led to a new trend; the desire to bring these products into other rooms in the house.
Over the course of the last couple of years, we have seen baths springing up outside in gardens, by the side of pools and the trend that has really taken off is to place a freestanding bath in the bedroom.
Freestanding baths can cost a lot of money which is perhaps why people are choosing to show them off by putting them centre stage in the bedroom. Offering a sense of pure luxury and grandeur, could the traditional en suite be a thing of the past, replaced by the ultimate open plan living space between bedroom and bathroom?
In actual fact, having a bath in a bedroom isn’t a new trend. It can be traced back to the Middle Ages when many of the rich lords would have a bath in their bedroom. Fast forward to the 1990s and the trend was revived by boutique hotels placing free standing roll-top baths at the end of huge beds. Popular with holiday makers, but thought to be too impractical to have in one’s own home, bathtubs in bedrooms are at last becoming a desirable feature; separate bathrooms are out, hello open plan bathing.
One area that is essential to making the trend work is space. If you don’t have space to build an en suite, your room probably isn’t big enough to hold a bathtub. A bathtub in the bedroom is not an option for space limited living, it works best as an indulgent feature to add interest to an already grand room.
It also significantly matters when it comes to the star of the show; the bath. It will be hard to create the look with a low to mid-market product. If you’re going to have a bathtub at the end of the bed, it’s got to be a feature, it’s got to have presence and make a statement. Cast iron, claw footed, roll-top baths are ideal. Whilst many consumers can be put off of installing them in a bathroom – the plumbing needs to be moved, coming up from the floor rather than out from the wall – this is the case for the bedroom too and actually involves about the same amount of work so shouldn’t necessarily put people off.
With all that in mind, there are some practicalities to think about. A bath in a bedroom is an experience and gives the room a real sense of luxury and is lovely for relaxing, taking time to unwind. However, when it comes to family living and splashing children, a separate bathtub in a family bathroom is most likely a must. Bedrooms tend to have electrical equipment, expensive items and soft furnishings that don’t mix very well bubbles or water!
We are certainly entering a new era of both bathroom products and design and it is a really exciting time for the industry. I can’t wait to see how this trend develops into 2022.
