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Your Personal Take on Residential Bathroom Types

Professional Student

What's your personal take on shared full bathroom spaces vs private full bathroom spaces. 

For example, some residential designs do not have master/primary bathrooms. Instead it's just one large bathroom with a large sink area, shower, and tub, and a separate toilet closet. 

And then others have the typical private full bath for master/primary bedroom and shared full bath. See floor plan examples below

Shared Bathroom Example Below:



Private Bathroom Example Below:

 Pros and Cons

Pros / Cons for Shared Bath
(+) Less fixtures
(+) Centralized location
(+) Allows more space to be allocated to other rooms
(-) Lacks privacy
(-) Possibly not enough fixtures (Wait for shower, toilet, sink) 

Pros / Cons for Private Bath
(+) Full Privacy
(+) Can utilize wetwall adjacent to shared bathroom
(+) Provides additional fixtures
(-) increases upfront cost of fixture count 
(-) increases floor area and walls
(-) additional MEP systems required. 

 
Jun 14, 24 9:44 pm
Non Sequitur

when is your homework due? 

Jun 14, 24 9:46 pm  · 
 ·  1
Professional Student

lol! I wish. Just curious to get other architects' opinions. I actually used to work in Japan and they had lots of shared bathrooms due to lack of space and cultural leanings (they really emphasized the bathtub location). But working in the US, complete opposite, they really love their own bathroom spaces, not even a separate toilet closet.

Jun 14, 24 9:50 pm  · 
 · 
Non Sequitur

Is it really a bathroom if there is no bath?

Jun 14, 24 10:00 pm  · 
 · 
archanonymous

Shitter room.

Jun 16, 24 9:40 am  · 
1  · 

I enjoyed when I lived in Vienna that we had a bath/shower in the apartment (in the kitchen, honestly) and the WC outside the apartment, in a compartment in the corridor. Every apartment had their WC outside the unit, in the shared corridor. This made more sense to me, to keep the waste portion separate from the bathing activities.

Jun 15, 24 1:54 pm  · 
 · 
bowling_ball

I visited Villa Savoie earlier this year and it was... a strange setup. Toilets were in their own tiny rooms, complete with door handles (but no way to wash your hands?). Then the bidets were basically exposed in the washrooms / bedrooms, without a door separating anything. As much as you can tell that hygiene played a huge role in the design, it's mostly figurative hygiene, not the kind that deals with bacteria and viruses, apparently. It felt very, very odd.

Jun 15, 24 8:34 pm  · 
3  · 

The WC absolutely has to include a place to wash your hands!

Jun 15, 24 11:43 pm  · 
 · 
Non Sequitur

That’s what the tank if for Donna. Very few people know of this life hack. On that note, a friend of mine lived in Lyon, France, and their toilet was in a tiny closet across the hall from a large bathroom. Sure, plenty of space in the other room for a throne and there was no sink with the toilet, but who’s going to argue with the French? The place also had orange carpet on the walls.

Jun 16, 24 10:28 am  · 
 · 
logon'slogin
Medieval Human Waste Disposal ...

Manual sewer systems

An early version of a sewer system in Europe, possibly in France. 
What about 4 bedroom 5 bath or more in real estate listings? Certain cultures have their favorite pastimes and rooms...

Jun 15, 24 9:29 pm  · 
 · 
Le Courvoisier

Sometimes you pee


Sometimes you poop


Sometimes with glee


Sometimes with soup

Jun 15, 24 10:13 pm  · 
 · 
Wood Guy

I've been designing and/or building homes and renovations in New England for 35 years (starting in high school) and I can count the number of clients who did not consider a dedicated master/primary bathroom to be absolutely essential on one hand. I, however, and my immediate family members have never had a dedicated master/primary bathroom and somehow we have survived. 

Jun 16, 24 11:30 am  · 
1  · 
JLC-1

I love bidets. On the subject, I did this  for a 6 kid bunk room a couple of years ago 


Jun 16, 24 5:10 pm  · 
3  · 
proto

paired showers for kids? seems more adult... or is it just two showers for a single?

Jun 17, 24 3:59 pm  · 
 · 
JLC-1

yes, it was a weird request, didn't dig further.

Jun 17, 24 4:28 pm  · 
 · 
Le Courvoisier

Damnit my poem was funny 

Jun 18, 24 12:32 am  · 
3  · 
Wood Guy

Good effort, anyway. ;-)

Jun 18, 24 10:28 am  · 
1  · 
gwharton

Our program standard is something like this:

  1. Primary Bedroom Suite gets a minimum 5-fixture private bathroom (large shower with 2 heads, freestanding tub, two lavatories, one toilet in a separate WC room).
  2. Secondary Bedroom gets its own private 3-fixture en-suite bathroom (tub/shower, lavatory, toilet all in one room)
  3. Guest Suite Bedrooms get their own private 4-fixture en-suite bathrooms (tub/shower, 2 lavatories, toilet all in one room)
  4. Additional bedrooms share a two-compartment 4-fixture bathroom (2 lavatories in the first chamber, toilet and tub-shower in the second) up to three bedrooms per shared bath.

Higher-end homes do not have shared bathrooms. They are all "en suite" - every bedroom gets own own private bathroom.

Jun 20, 24 2:04 pm  · 
2  · 
gwharton

Also note, related to this, that standard American cultural practice is for doors to always swing IN to the more private space from the less private space. The rest of the world doesn't really do that (e.g. in Europe and many parts of Asia, front entry doors swing out, while in the USA they always swing in). That has a significant effect on bathroom layouts for residences in the US.

Jun 20, 24 2:08 pm  · 
 · 
reallynotmyname

For us, an en suite for every sleeping room is the goal when space and budget permit. Some additional spaces like a home office or game room may also have their own adjacent baths with a w/c and sink. Very few people in the US will say "my house has too many bathrooms".

Jun 20, 24 2:40 pm  · 
2  · 
JLC-1

We have done a couple of primary bedroom suites with His and Hers bathrooms, make up vanity and soaking tub, like this one

Jun 20, 24 2:47 pm  · 
1  · 
Non Sequitur

We also have individual laundry rooms in addition to ensuite washrooms in most bedrooms.

Jun 20, 24 3:06 pm  · 
 · 
Wood Guy

You guys are designing for a wealthier clientele than I am. Most of my projects are under 2400 sf; a large house for me is 3200 sf, with construction costs around $400-500/sf. We can't afford the space or cost of all those extraneous bathrooms and bathtubs that don't get used.

Jun 20, 24 3:36 pm  · 
3  · 
JLC-1

WG, that's true, we are at 1000-1200/sq.ft. and over 5500 sq ft often. Just got a call from a client cancelling today's meeting because he couldn't land his plane with the weather.

Jun 20, 24 4:34 pm  · 
3  · 
gwharton

Yeah. I should have qualified that. Our typical homes range from 3600 to 4500 sq. ft. But we build them all the way up to around 8000-9000 sq. ft.

Jun 20, 24 5:27 pm  · 
1  · 

Wood Guy - your budget for a single family residence is often greater than the budget for my commercial work.

Jun 20, 24 5:40 pm  · 
1  · 
BulgarBlogger

wow, the image above represents awful drafting.

Jun 21, 24 9:45 am  · 
 ·  1

Well bless your heart.


Care to show us some of your drafting so we can learn the good way? 

Jun 21, 24 10:58 am  · 
4  · 
BulgarBlogger

Sorry - I can't compromise my clients' privacy; but it doesn't take a lot to determine that the above image shows a snip from what appears to be a construction document plan with too much information on it that is both a disaster in terms of graphics and organization / hierarchy of content. Looks like someone sitting in their basement banging out a drawing for some exorbitantly low fee who took no pride in the work they do.

Jun 21, 24 12:31 pm  · 
 ·  1

You could post up a 'snip' of a drawing and show us how it's supposed to be done without compromising your clients privacy.

Try and behave like an adult.

Jun 21, 24 12:48 pm  · 
3  · 
gwharton

Here's an example, snipped so it's anonymized.


Jun 21, 24 12:52 pm  · 
1  · 
Non Sequitur

Not sure what the yelling is about... but this is the most info I'll put in a drawing.  Screen shot for in-progress washroom plan.



Jun 21, 24 2:51 pm  · 
4  · 
Almosthip

my take on a washroom layout

Jun 21, 24 3:41 pm  · 
2  · 
BulgarBlogger

Much better!

Jun 21, 24 4:33 pm  · 
 · 
BulgarBlogger

Here:

Jun 21, 24 12:59 pm  · 
2  · 

Now this is helpful and productive!

Jun 24, 24 3:26 pm  · 
1  · 
atelier nobody

NO JACK&JILLS!!!!!!

Jun 24, 24 4:48 pm  · 
 · 

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