Main Bathroom Reveal: Faux Wood Tiles, Mocha Grout and a Delta Faucet
Three months, one wallpaper battle, and approximately four hundred trips to the hardware store later, the main bathroom is done. Let's talk about the choices that made it.
Faux wood tiles on the floor
We love wood floors. We do not love wood floors in a bathroom. Porcelain faux wood tiles gave us the look of planks with none of the warping. A few tips:
- Use a 1/3 offset, not 1/2, on long plank tiles to avoid lippage from slight bowing.
- Mix tiles from several boxes so the printed grain patterns don't repeat side by side.
- Use tight grout joints (1/16" to 1/8") so it reads as wood, not tile.
Why mocha grout
White grout on a wood-look floor screams "tile!" and turns gray in a month. Mocha grout blends into the plank tones and hides dirt. Sanded grout for the floor, unsanded for the wall tile, and a penetrating sealer on both after 72 hours.
The Delta faucet
We picked a Delta faucet in oil rubbed bronze to warm up all the gray. Two things we liked: Delta's cartridge design makes repairs easy, and their lifetime warranty is real (we've already used it on a kitchen faucet). If you want a matching drinking water faucet in the kitchen, Delta makes those in the same finish too.
Door hardware: removing a Weslock door knob
The old brass Weslock knob had to go, and it didn't come off the way most knobs do. Here's the trick for Weslock door knob removal:
- Look for a tiny slot on the neck of the interior knob.
- Push a small flat screwdriver or the tip of a paper clip into the slot to depress the spring catch.
- Pull the knob off while holding the catch down. The rose (trim plate) then pops off to reveal the screws.
- Remove the screws and slide out both halves and the latch.
We replaced it with a simple oil-rubbed bronze lever to match the faucet. Small details, big difference.
The verdict: from our most hated room to one of our favorites. That's the whole point of this blog.
