Freestanding Baths Add Instant Bathroom Style
A stunning addition to your home, a freestanding bath will match in almost anyplace. With conventional and contemporary roll top designs abounding, they are getting some thing of a revival. And they don't have to be confined to the bathroom: you could place your new addition in your bedroom for a touch of boutique hotel chic.
Traditional roll top baths have graced stately homes for centuries. Whilst your personal bathroom might be a small much more humble than that in a listed manor house, you can choose to have one of these striking attributes grace your period home - and it needn't cost the earth! Purchasing a second-hand cast iron bath is one way of establishing your green credentials in the bathroom as nicely as saving money you can then clean it up and repaint the outdoors, or get it professionally re enamelled, to give the old bath a new lease of life. As the centrepiece of a refitted bathroom, this could look simply stunning.
If your home is more 21st century than Victorian era, although, you'll find a wide variety of contemporary freestanding baths available from a variety of manufacturers utilizing modern supplies and design techniques, they're in a position to diverge from the conventional shape and do some thing a little bit various.
Whether or not your style is traditional or modern, you will need to know your terminology before you go shopping. Freestanding baths come in two primary lengths and several basic styles. The classic roll top is a generously sized bath, while the slipper is a small shorter, becoming raised at one finish to support your back and neck as you soak. Either of these styles can be either single or double ended: a single ended bath has the taps at one finish, and a double ended bath has the taps in the middle, so that the bath can comfortably accommodate two.
If you are short of space, and a slipper bath isn't right for your room, a 'back-to-wall' style provides you the look of a freestanding bath but with a straight edge which fits up against the wall, saving you vital inches. Alternatively, a corner style will make nonetheless much better use of space by fitting up neatly against two walls.
A range of supplies are available too: from conventional cast iron through to modern acrylic or stone resin. Bear in mind, though, that a bath will be extremely heavy as soon as it's filled with water, and the use of heavier supplies will compound this problem: make sure that the joists of your bathroom floor are powerful sufficient to support the type of bath you favour.
Much of the beauty of a freestanding bath lies in its accessories: a conventional roll top bath would not have the same visual influence if it was missing its intricate clawed feet and its freestanding taps. Similarly, the clean lines of a modern freestanding bath can be enhanced by some simple, modern, wall mounted taps, or you could bring an oriental look to your bath by selecting a model with wooden block feet.
