Rose Gold Renovation?

Don’t know what to do with that 25 year old bathroom? Don’t have the dollars to do a total renovation? There is always room for a budget friendly improvement…you just need to find your inspiration!

Our home is 25 years old. When we built it I chose pink formica countertops in my kitchen and pale pink tiles for the floor. The early 90s was the wallpaper era, so even my family room had a pale paisley pink on its walls. Honestly we thought we would never move and I wanted my house to reflect me, not the taupes and browns that all the builders were trying to force on me.

I clearly remember the man going over our selections in the kitchen and warning me that the pale pink formica would make my home difficult to resell. The pale pink formica has long since been replaced by a very nice dark granite. This past year all of our floors were updated and the pale pink tiles gave way to hand-scraped vintage hickory wood.

Little by little we have taken down the wallpapers, painted every honey-oak door and window frame white and replaced all of our baseboards with a much stronger presence in white that we built up in three layers. (I’ll talk about that another day)

But one room needing a desperate update is our master bath. The problem is we know that to replace the shower, doors, tub, vanity, tops, fixtures and floor will run in excess of $15,000, probably closer to $20,000 and we just don’t have the funds for it, period.

We are on track to move in about 6 years and we will definitely want to have made some significant improvements to attract buyers.

Today I  got an idea to make some budget friendly changes that compliment what I have and “make it work.” ( since I am using the fashion world to find my inspiration, a little Tim Gunn motivating quote is in order)

Listing a home on the market in at least the past 6 years with brass fixtures…well it was sort of like having the mark of death. Some people won’t look past it and move on. Our complete remodel plans included shiny chrome to complement a light marble which we were hoping to add. But when I got this inspiration I considered the newest and hottest color trend out now and wondered if I could apply that fashion color to my bath.

At first you just noticed it in jewelry…which I bought for myself with Christmas money this past December. It is crazy beautiful.

We had an evening out last week and I decided to do a little wardrobe shopping. I found this little sparkly sweater that I just kept coming back to and was trying to figure out what would go with it. I would hold it up with gold and it clearly was not gold then I would hold it up with pink and that wasn’t it either. So I left it and went off to shop elsewhere. As I was on my way out of the store I remembered that I needed to check out the shoes…OH MY! I had never seen such incredibly spectacular shoes in my life! They definitely made a statement on their own, but I did’t mind. I bought them and suddenly realized they were the match to that sweater and by the same company. So I went out that evening in my ROSE GOLD SHOES, ROSE GOLD JEWELRY and ROSE GOLD SWEATER. If I thought it was just me that loved them, I soon found out they were a favorite to all.

So here they are…shoes, jewelry and the amazing color trending ROSE GOLD.

I decided to see if anyone was making ROSE GOLD bathroom fixtures.

Yes, they are! Still very difficult to find and not too many selections available but I would imagine we will begin to see more selections as the year goes forward. You may be saying “that is really risky to put something in your bath that is so rare.” That is true. But remember we are looking at a budget friendly update and these faucets are an improvement over our current outdated brass.

Here is a more contemporary facuet

These fixtures along with towel bars are all under $200. Unfortunately I was told by a plumber that our tub would need to have the caulking cut and lifted out in order to change out the faucets and of course you can’t change the trim on your shower doors so while I am very inspired by the color, I can’t replace all of the brass and it would be a huge mistake to mix it up.

After some quick research I found that Rose Gold Spray Paint is available at my local Walmart Store. To be certain this would look great with my pink tiles, I may need to spray some thing and set it against my tile just to see what I think. Painting all of the plumbing fixtures would be a few days project and lots of prep work so I don’t want to make the decision without being sold on it.

The other issue is the wallpaper. One huge positive I can say about wall paper is that it wears so well and in 25 years no painting needed. I remember people warning me not to put wallpaper in our bathroom because it would not tolerate the high humidity and would peel off. Not the case at all. This was Waverly wall paper and I hired some folks to hang it since it had vaulted ceilings and lots and lots of cuts in it. They actually still sell this exact pattern today…a Waverly Classic…in fact on Waverly.com once you click on the products and then wall paper, my pattern in my color is the first to pop up!

I am letting you in on my process here. I love the idea of this but another hot look at the moment is this actual soft blush pink that is the color of my tiles and true gold. Again, look to the popular items that are available on the market to see the color trends.

I actually have this complete planner set and some of the gold accessories I loved as well. Take a look at a lot of the blogging sites or products bloggers are selling and you will see the strongest color trends are pink whether pale or bright, gold metal and the always classic black and white.

While I was going to put a picture of a gold stapler here, in locating it I actually found a Rose Gold stapler by a well known fashion brand.

Wow! I have to order this. From the picture I definitely see this as a Rose Gold and when I found another stapler in true gold I just was not interested. Big clue on finding what makes you happy. Start to go in another direction and pay attention to your resistance or the ability to leave something behind. I am captivated by the color of this.

So, what is next? Well, I am going to play around with some Rose Gold products in my bath and see how I like them with my tile. Then I need to consider the walls. I have to remove the blue coral. I saw another very bold wallpaper yesterday on the Luxe twitter feed.

I LOVE this wall paper! This is big and busy but keeping everything else simple in the room it could be just gorgeous. One reason I lean toward a wallpaper in our bath is because our ceilings are vaulted and there is a lot of wall that won’t have any shelves or windows or anything on them which can just look a little tired and empty. The wall paper will draw attention to these features which make this bathroom stand out.

Honestly just scrolling down from the stapler to the wallpaper makes me really excited! I can’t tell the true color of the wallpaper here and I have a gray carpet in my bath so it can’t be too taupe. But you can always order a sample.

What do you think? Have you any other suggestions on color combos to make some quick changes while keeping my pale pink tile and gray carpet?

Oh and let’s not forget my cabinets.

These cabinets are still in great shape after 25 years. They are solid wood. I had already updated once as you can see by changing out my handles to match the seaside theme of the bath.  You typically would not find the large space between doors in new cabinetry. I have painted cabinets before, so that is definitely an option but it would be one of the last things I would do because they can’t go back once painted.

In closing, this is just the beginning. My mind is thinking about inexpensive updates that could potentially stay if we do a complete renovation in the next two years.

I am open to your suggestions, cabinet colors? Wallpaper, paint, anything except flooring, tub, tile and major pieces.

I look forward to your comments!

1 Thessalonians 4:11 make it your ambition to lead a quiet life: You should mind your own business and work with your hands