Your bathroom should be a place where you can relax, pamper and rejuvenate and it's also one of the principal rooms that will sell your house. Keeping it modern, stylish and functional is a must. Nowadays, a lot of modern houses have small bathrooms but this doesn't mean you can't make a small bathroom look stylish and also give the illusion it has lots of space.
The first step is to make the most of all the natural light available to you, if you are lucky to have a window in your bathroom then make sure you are allowing as much natural light in as possible. If not, make sure you have a good extractor fan to keep your bathroom feeling airy and light, and of course to avoid dampness and mould. If your budget is big enough you could invest in a skylight to give you a little extra light in your bathroom and stay environmentally friendly at the same time. You could also go for spot lighting on the ceiling or on the floor, this makes a room look larger, especially when spot lights on the floor are angled towards the cabinets.
To compliment the light in your bathroom, you should stick to a pale colour scheme, lighter walls will make the bathroom look larger. If you're a fan of colour, you can always spruce up your bathroom with boldly coloured accessories - by keeping the walls looking natural and light, you will make the room appear bigger and brighter.
Another huge space-saving factor is to ensure you are maximising your storage space, a family of four using one small bathroom can create a lot of clutter so make sure you have sufficient storage space and give everything in your bathroom a place it can be put away and stored. This will help keep your bathroom clutter-free.
You should consider the bath and shower arrangements carefully - some with small bathrooms might have to sacrifice a bath for a larger shower fixture. If you think a bath is essential then you can always squeeze a fancy shower head in above it - getting the best of both worlds. For your shower screen try and opt for a transparent one as this will open up space. You should also opt for a sliding screen rather than one that opens up - the same goes for all cabinet doors. You could even unhinge the door leading to your bathroom and change to a sliding door if want to create more space in your bathroom.
A statement piece always helps to break up a room and create more space, by creating a focal point you are taking attention away from the space in the room and focusing on one piece - it could be an elegant mirror, a beautiful statement cabinet or a luxury sink.
If you want to design your bathroom from scratch, you should use bathroom planner software to help plan your room and to make sure you're maximising space in every possible way. Using simple CAD design software will allow you to plan your room on a computer-based programme to exactly the right dimensions and if you aren't happy with it, you can edit it with the click of a button, and chop and change things as you wish. The software allows you to be completely confident with your design before the labour starts so there's no changing and moving things around costing you extra money.