Tessa and Mark had lived with a 1.6-metre-deep, dark, north-facing bathroom for fifteen years. The interior wall between the bathroom and the laundry was non-load-bearing — a quick site visit confirmed it — so the obvious move was to pull it.
The new layout puts the WC to the left as you enter, the vanity on the long wall under a refurbished steel-frame window, and a 1500mm walk-in shower at the rear. Auckland Council consent took six weeks; the build itself ran eleven weeks on site.
The biggest budget line, after labour, was the steel-frame window restoration. Worth every dollar — north light through 1960s steel mullions does something to a room nothing modern can.