Tiling a small bathroom?

Tiling a small bathroom requires careful planning as with all interior design and is a subjective question as to what you would choose as everyone has different tastes, wants and needs. What looks heavenly to one person can look like it’s been dragged up from the depths of hell by another, which is why I often wonder what the owner was really thinking when I see a bathroom tile setup with a bright pink colour scheme. You know what they say though; each to their own.

Can Bathroom Tiles Make a Small Bathroom Look Bigger?

Certainly, it all depends on what sort of style you opt for. It’s a well-known rule that using lighter colours will help a room look bigger, so carry that advice over to your bathroom too. Choosing lighter colours for your bathroom tiles, such as white or cream, will help make your small bathroom look that much bigger thanks to the tiles reflecting more light than darker coloured tiles would. You can mix and match colours by having dark with light; such as black and white tiles, but whatever you go for you’ll want to keep the colour scheme at least 50% light if you don’t want to end up feeling boxed into your small space.

On the other hand, the placement of fixtures and fittings in your bathroom can have an effect on what size of tiles you use. If there’s little wall space between shower and the toilet, for example, then small tiles will create a better flow than larger tiles. This is simply because you may not be able to fit in many larger tiles without cutting them down.

Another neat trick to use in small bathrooms is to lay your tiles in a diagonal pattern. Diagonal patterns trick our primitive brains into thinking that a space is bigger than it really is. When you take a look at squared tiles they’re pretty easy to count, but tip them diagonally and your eyes are drawn to the diagonal points while your brain has a lot more trouble figuring out just how many tiles are actually on the wall.

What Size of Tiles Should I Get?

The great thing about bathroom tiles is the huge diversity in sizes and styles available. However, just because a type of tile looks good on paper it doesn’t mean it’s going to look good in your bathroom. You do have to take the size of your bathroom into account though, as not every style will completely suit the space confines you’re working with, but at the end of the day it’s up to you to choose what’s going to fit your taste. It can be hard to envisage what your bathroom will look like fully tiled if you only have a sample to go off, but give it a shot i am sure you will not be disappointed.

Generally interior designers will say that you shouldn’t use large bathroom tiles in a small bathroom as it will make the room look smaller. However, using smaller tiles can give you just as many problems. If you opt for lots of smaller tiles for a small bathroom then you’ll end up with a lot of grout lines, which can give the bathroom walls a grid-like appearance that can promote the feeling of being more boxed in. Of course, larger tiles have fewer grout lines, so you’re better off meeting in the middle and opting for medium sized tiles around 40x25cm to get the best effect.