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Lindsey Thomason

Simple Life + Working Mom

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adding bath tub subway tile

June 22, 2016 by Lindsey Leave a Comment

Thanks so much for all the love and well wishes on yesterday’s post! We’re very excited and had no clue how much you all would be too! 

Jumping right back into DIY related things…!

If you recall we redid the main bathroom ourselves last spring. At the time I mentioned that the tile in the tub was in decent condition so we just cleaned up the grout and left it. Well over the last year or so we started to notice leaks on the floor where the tub and floor meet. We weren’t sure if the leak was from a pipe or from the tile not being sealed or from the large window that was in the shower.

adding bath tub subway tile

Really the only way to find out was to tear all the tile down and figure it out. So we did. We hired a contractor for this project because we knew we wanted to ditch the window anyway. It’s not the best idea to have a window like that in a shower as it collects water and there’s a lot of place for water to get into.

Here’s the before, with the window already removed:

Bath tile before

We didn’t tackle this ourselves because with the window being replaced, the exterior wall needing to be fixed up and the mold that was likely to be found we felt it was better left to a professional.

Bath Tile Demo

Turns out the leak was entirely caused by the window. There was so much water damage on the wall underneath the window and eventually the water had nowhere to go so it was forced around the perimeter of the tub and pooling on the floor.

Window Demo

New Window

We had him remove the window, replace the entire wall where all the water damage was, remove the arch that was over the shower, re-tile the walls and fix up the exterior siding. The demo was intense. He said it was one of the hardest bathroom demos he’s done and we did end up with a good sized hole in our living room wall. Whoops. But he fixed it!

Wall Backer Board

Wall Tile Spacers

It’s amazing how much larger the bathroom feels just by removing that arch. While it added character there was no place for it in a bathroom so small. We chose a beveled white tile and a light gray grout that all ties in so well with the floor we tiled last year.

Tile

We did want to keep a window since the natural light and ventilation is nice so we chose a small, sliding window that was installed up high so water can’t really get to it. And, it was simply installed correctly whereas the last one was not.

Window & tile

The whole thing is amazing. The bathroom feels bigger, there are no leaks, there’s a spot for shampoo and soap and it’s just clean and fresh.

Finished Bathroom Tile

The total cost was roughly $3500 for the supplies and labor. It was well worth it as we knew this was a project that we wouldn’t have been able to do alone. I mean maybe we would have but we probably would have had a hole in the side of our house for a while. And that would have been awkward.

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Filed Under: Home Tagged With: bath tub subway tile, bathroom subway tile, shower subway tile, shower subway tile surround, subway tile

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