August 6, 2022  

Small Bathroom Makeover: Updating Our Builder-Grade Bathroom On A Budget


New decor and a lot of paint gave our primary bathroom a modern look. Check out the painted floor, painted cabinet, and all the before and afters!

Our primary bathroom was as builder-basic as you can get–builder white walls, the standard mirror clipped to the wall, a honey oak vanity, a basic shower, and vinyl flooring.

I set out to give our boring bathroom a cosmetic makeover using almost entirely paint and I’m obsessed with how it all turned out! Seriously, can you believe those checkered floors are painted?

I feel like a broken record, but paint really does have the power to change an entire space. I painted the walls, vanity, floors, door, and trim. No big renovation or fancy tile or new vanity, just me and a lot of paint.

Let’s take a tour of our “new” master bathroom! Get ready for some awesome before and after photos, and I hope this inspires you to take a paintbrush to something dated or blah in your own home. Paint is pretty much magic in my book!

Check out my past budget-friendly bathroom makeovers:

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Tour Our DIY Bathroom Makeover

It’s hard to believe this is even the same bathroom! This room used to feel so bland and orange-y but now it feels fresh and clean and modern. These before and afters side by side really show how different the room looks and feels now.

If you look at the before photo above, you’ll notice we had a little shelf on the wall on the side of the vanity. The last owner’s of our house left that shelf there and we just adopted it as the only place to put things like contact solution and deodorant.

I’ve always been annoyed by that shelf and was excited to finally get it out of here, but I was not prepared for just how much roomier the sink area feels without that shelf sticking out from the wall. Seriously such a difference!

I’m glad we have an en suite bathroom, but isn’t it weird how small it is? Our house was built in 2005 and as cookie cutter as they come so I wouldn’t expect a grand bathroom or anything but is it to much to ask to having a couple of drawers in the vanity?

The only storage in this bathroom is the vanity cabinet. I still need to organize it, but most of our things will be stored under there. I also added two small shelves above the toilet and we’ll leave some of the decorative items you see here but I will also make more room for a few more of our daily personal care items for convenience.

Now let’s take some time to admire that painted vanity and painted floor! I used this cabinet painting kit to give our dated honey oak cabinet a modern look and added these beautiful brass knobs. So much better, right?!

The checkered floor was a labor of love but the time I put into painting it was 100% worth it. That floor really makes the room!

Painting our old vinyl flooring wasn’t exactly hard but it did take a lot of time (lots of dry time between colors/coats). It also took a crazy amount of painter’s tape! I’ll work on a blog post with more details about how I painted it using this floor paint.

Finally, let’s spin around and take a look at the other side of this tiny room. I’ve been painting our interior doors and replacing the hardware one by one as I paint each room in our house. The new light grey looks so nice, doesn’t it?

I added a little art above our towel hooks. I also swapped out the light switch plate for a pretty brass one. Little details make all the difference!

Bathroom Sources

Bathroom Paint Colors:

Bathroom Decor:


Check out my past budget-friendly bathroom makeovers:

Have a fantastic day!

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