The Bathroom Project, Phase I

The bathroom was a mess.  Both the walls and ceiling had been "textured".  Some of this was peeling from the ceiling and all of it looked bad.  When we originally saw the house, the former owner had lots of "stuff" all around (on the walls, flat surfaces, floor) so the problems didn't shout out at us... plus we really didn't take a good look at it... and, if we had, it wouldn't have mattered anyway.  
Original bath
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Soon after we moved in, Mike made a few changes.  He replaced the wall light fixtures on either side of the medicine cabinet with a single fixture.  This revealed a more pleasant blue unlike the depressing shade on the rest of the walls where the paint had faded.  Because I'm very fond of the oval mirror we had bought two houses ago, he also removed the medicine cabinet, which left two holes in the wall through which you could check out the activity in the laundry room next door.  And he installed a new faucet... just because.  It was "pewter" which looked great in the Home Depot display but which I soon grew to dislike when I could never completely remove the water spots.  

A few months later, when it warmed up just a bit, Mike replaced all the windows in the house.  We decided to go with a shorter window in the bathroom, more in scale with the room.  After that, it was on to other more pressing projects for many months.

Then, one day, late in August 2005, fresh from rebuilding the side porch, Mike decided to tackle Phase I of the bathroom remodel.  He had the holes in the wall patched and the eletrical work done before I got out my camera.
Phase 1 - 3 Phase 1 - 2 Phase 1 - 4  
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 Notice the arch over the tub area.  This looked o.k., but it trapped a lot of moisture and, consequently, was a great breeding ground for mildew.  At some point, someone put a vent in the arch, but it didn't do much good.

So, down came the arch.  It turned out to be a metal frame that was attached to the drywall.
Phase 1- 4 Phase 1 - 5
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You can see that lovely textured ceiling and wall in the expanded view of the next two pictures.  Mike furred out the ceiling and covered it with 1/2 inch sheetrock.
Phase 1 - 6 Phase 1 - 7
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The tile that wrapped around the corner by the toilet was removed.  The walls were prepared for plastering.  And the plaster was applied.
Phase 1 - 8 Phase 1 - 9 Phase 1 - 10 Phase 1 - 11
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Next task was painting the wainscoting and then glueing and nailing it to the wall.
Phase 1 - 12 Phase 1 - 13 Phase 1 - 14
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Mike removed the vanity and installed the pedestal sink with the new faucet.  It is easier to clean, but I obviously didn't dry it off before I took the picture below.
Phase 1 - 15 Phase 1 - 16
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The trim/moulding was installed in layers at the top of the wainscoting.  
 Phase 1 - 17 Phase 1 - 18
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The crown mould goes up.  Mike scraped and removed the paint from the original baseboard before reinstalling it.  The rest of the moulding gets a coat of paint and we sample the blue paint.
Phase 1 - 19 Phase 1 - 20 Phase 1 - 21
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The blue looked O.K. and so it was rolled on.  It looks darker than it shows here.  For the record, it's Glidden, Jazz Blue, semi-gloss.  There were no tiles under the old vanity so Mike patched some in until we get to Phase 2.
Phase 1 - 22 Phase 1 - 23
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There was latex paint on one side of the door which wasn't sticking too good.  Off it came.
Phase 1 - 24 Phase 1 - 25
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