We have a half bath next to the laundry room right as you come through the door by the garage. At first, it seemed like an odd place for a bathroom to me. My experience had seen half baths near the main entry and were used mostly by guests. However, someone pointed out that this was probably meant to be the place you use when you come in from working outside where you didn't have to worry about getting the rest of the house dirty.
Well, I guess that made sense, but guests still used that bathroom sometimes. And it was definitely worse for the wear. It had all of the original 30 year old fixtures with rusting plumbing, walls that had permanent stains, and finishes flaking off the vanity and moldings. No amount of scrubbing made it look better. I was embarrassed when guests used it because it looked like we never cleaned in there.
This month we finally did something about it. We were gifted some paint that was leftover from a friend and decided that this bathroom was a good place to use it. At some point, the previous owners had done a poor job of trying to restain the moldings and paint the walls which resulted in a lot of prep time for us. We also decided the room was too small for the extra shelf and towel bar and removed them.
The results. A very simple, unremarkable bathroom, which was just what we were going for. Our goal was to get the bathroom to a place where no one would notice it, where as before, it was noticed for how grubby it looked. And all it took was a good coat of paint (and a lot of sanding).
