Snoqualmie Ridge Master Bathroom Remodel | Case Study

snoqualmie ridge master bath remodel — Master Bathroom Renovation in the Snoqualmie Ridge neighborhood

During the housing boom, I worked on several of the homes that were constructed in the Snoqualmie Ridge neighborhood. That’s why it was funny to me when I was approached about renovating this bathroom. It didn’t seem like it should be at that stage yet.

Be sure to check out the full photo gallery of before, during, and after images at the bottom of this page

However, this was one of the earlier homes, built in the ’90s, and I certainly couldn’t argue that it was too soon once I saw the bathroom. A small shower, vinyl and carpeted bathroom floors, and a large space without a lot of storage were just some of the issues.

So the homeowners brought in myself and Ginger McGruder, a local Designer, to renovate this master bathroom in the Snoqualmie Ridge neighborhood.

The Problems:

The shower is too small
The shower is too dark
The tub is too big
There are too many walls
Not enough storage space
Carpeted bathroom floor
The plumbing pipes are bad quality
It looks dated

The plan for this Snoqualmie Ridge Master Bathroom Remodel

snoqualmie ridge bathroom before — There are too many walls which make the shower small and dark

Open up the room

The first order of business for this Snoqualmie Ridge master bathroom remodel was to remove the wall in between the bathtub and the shower.

This will allow more natural light from the window to come in and allow for a larger shower.

Snoqualmie Ridge freestanding tub — A freestanding tub was chosen to make the space look bigger

Install a smaller freestanding bathtub

Like many people, these homeowners rarely use the bathtub. So having a big bathtub that takes up a lot of space just doesn’t make a lot of sense.

Instead, a new freestanding bathtub is on the agenda and will make the space look much bigger. It will also give a few more inches that can be used for the shower which is used daily.

Shrink the toilet closet

The real space gains for the shower are coming from the toilet closet which is quite spacious. Too spacious, in fact.

So, the wall between the shower and toilet is removed and moved over several inches. This will make the toilet space more normal (36 inches wide) and the shower more functional.

Walk in shower snoqualmie — A 48×48 inch shower with clear glass was installed. The black tape was removed after installation

Make the master shower larger

With the space gained from removing the tub wall and moving the toilet closet wall the shower will now be 48×48 inches wide.

Consequently, with the walls removed and two large clear glass panels on the shower it makes the bathroom feel much larger and less claustrophobic.

double vanity snoqualmie — A linen closet was added to the right of the double vanity. Mirrored medicine cabinet also helped with storage

Move the vanity and add a linen closet

To gain storage space, the vanity will be moved over about two feet and an enclosed linen closet with a door was built in.

Also, two mirrored medicine cabinets were recessed into the wall and a vanity with several drawers was selected.

Replace the cheap CPVC plumbing

One of the problems with the Snoqualmie Ridge neighborhood is that some of the homes have CPVC plumbing pipes throughout. This is the cheap brittle white pipes that you see in the photo below.

These types of plumbing pipes have a high failure rate and can cause a lot of damage to the home in a short amount of time.

With this in mind, we removed as much of the pipe that we could reach and replaced it with good quality PEX and copper piping.

The connections from old and new pipes were made in such a way that if there ever was a problem with the CPVC pipe that it could be removed and replaced without tearing into the new bathroom.

cpvc plumbing pipe snoqualmie — The cheap and problematic CPVC plumbing pipe was removed in the bathroom

Add electric floor heat under the tile floor

One of the “hotter” features is electric in-floor heat, especially in the colder Snoqualmie Ridge area. We installed a Suntouch floor heat system with a WiFi thermostat that can be controlled with an app on your phone.

Install low maintenance porcelain tile and stain-proof grouts throughout

Like many people, these homeowners didn’t want to spend all of their time cleaning tile and resealing grout.

Hence, the tile chosen was Carrara marble looking porcelain tile which is impervious (unlike its finicky marble counterpart) and the newer non-cementitious grouts which don’t need sealing and are marketed as “stain-proof”.

The Result of this Snoqualmie Ridge Master Bathroom Remodel

The new bathroom is the same space and square footage as it was before the renovation. However, the space is used in a much smarter way and it will serve the homeowners for years to come.