One Last Historical Bathroom Surprise
So, what's the hold up with our "after" pictures of the first floor bathroom? The fact is, there's an amazing amount of work that goes in to completing the finishing touches. I know that we were thinking that once Paul was done and packed up his tile cutter, everything would be perfect with a bow on top. In hindsight I think we were duped again by the unrealistic expectations those home improvement TV shows give you that everything wraps up perfectly in 30 minutes. Getting a renovation done right takes time!
So, while we continue to wrap things up here's another fun piece of bungalow archaeology we found behind the built-in today...
When we removed the built-in's drawers to strip the paint off, we found the original plaster wall and hex tile. We'd seen the original tile before but we'd never noticed the wall. (Click on the photo to enlarge it.)
While it looked at first like it was notched in preparation for ceramic tile, we pulled out our copy of Bungalow Bathrooms and confirmed something very interesting:
"To save money, the plaster could be scored to look like tile and was sometimes finished with a glaze over the paint to make it appear more tile-like." (p. 114)
How cool is that! Unintentionally, by not removing the built-in to replace the floor and walls behind it we unintentionally preserved a neat historical element of our home!
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Comments
We have that type of scored plaster in our bathroom. It's under so many layers of paint, it is impossible to tell if it had a "glazey" look at one time. Maybe I should start scraping.
Posted by: Sandra | March 10, 2004 12:50 PM
Our bathrooms have these type of walls. I've always wondered if there is a good way to preserve them.
Can't wait to see the final product.
Posted by: isg | March 10, 2004 1:59 PM
Oh, the beadboard looks nice! The suspense is hard to take....The walls in our bathroom are done the same manner to look like subway tiles.
Posted by: heather | March 11, 2004 11:57 AM
we found the plaster "faux tile" in our downstairs powder room when we took off a cheesy chair rail (maybe it's called a throne rail in the bathroom?). unfortunately, the plaster's been painted, wallpapered, etc, over the years, and it's beyond salvation...
your bathroom is looking good, guys! bravo!
Posted by: mary | March 12, 2004 7:24 AM