Chalk this one up in the trendy column. The new Tissue Box from Essey brings back the award-winning crumple of its predecessor, Bin Bin. Designed by the same John Brauer, Tissue takes its queue from the contents within. Bauer says about the object: “The idea came to me when I passed a tissue box in Japan and noticed the crumpled paper sticking out. In that particular case, the box cover did not reflect the content. I wanted to have balance between the cover and content to give the product a relevant identity.” I want to know, did this tissue box passing commence before or after the creation of Bin Bin? Just curious!

Tissue Box available from Unica Home: $30

Really beautiful home from Australian architecture firm Jackson Clements Burrows. The Armadale House was an alterations and additions project to an existing Victorian home that had been previously renovated in the 80s. The project involved a complete refurbishment on the existing structure as well as an addition of a new upper level. This upper level was divided into two private zones for the children and parents. While it definitely looks great from the outside, I’m most excited about that gorgeous white kitchen! And that master bath!

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I’ve been scouring the web for a wall-mount sink for a certain tiny little bathroom that resides in my home. I’ve seen some cool ones from Kohler, but I don’t really want to spend a thousand dollars. There were a couple that caught my eye on Overstock as well, but I’m still not quite satisfied. Has anyone seen any modern-looking, wall-mount sinks that won’t break the bank? Share your finds, and links, please!

Images:
Escale Wall-Mount Lavatory by Kohler: $500 - $650
Tableau Wall-Mount Lavatroy by Kohler: $1000 - $1500

I realized yesterday that I never put up any last pics of our bathroom to show our shower completely finished. It has been done for quite a while now, and we really love it, especially the dual showerhead. To pull the whole dual showerhead off on the cheap we ended up going with a Danze Parma shower/tub combo. The Parma has the tub diverter right next to where you turn the water on (instead of a pull up thing on the tub spout) so it makes for a clean look. Instead of diverting to a tub spout, it goes to our adjustable shower wand. Set it somewhere in between and you get dual shower heads! The tub/shower combo was around $350 and the wand was about $150. $500 isn’t exactly cheap by my standards, but compared to any other dual head systems I could find it was a steal.
More pictures after the jump.
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When we were first looking into making an ofuro, one of the things we considered was pouring one out of concrete. The good thing about concrete is that the material is cheap, and with a little hard work it lends itself well to the DIY approach. We quickly bagged the idea because there is no possible way our floor could support the weight. This morning I stumbled across an old post on Apartment Therapy with a gorgeous DIY bathroom built for under 3k which includes a concrete ofuro. The soaking tub only cost about $200 according to the owner splat girl. She did mention that it was a lot of work though.
Check out her flicker photo set and the Apartment Therapy post.

This was sent in by a David M a long time reader. He is currently remodeling a mid-century modern home in Renton just south of Seattle. While redoing his bathroom he wanted to put in a vanity similar to the Kohler Purist but didn’t want to spend $1,500. With a little creativity he was able to take this Ikea STOLMEN and make it work as a wall mount vanity. I think you will agree when I say it looks great. The price of the STOLMEN was $80, which makes it a very affordable alternative. He finished it all off with a sink an faucet similar to what we have in our bathroom.
More pics here.

Things happen slower when you do them yourself. Over a year ago I posted about our bathroom vanity that I had just built. I did a walnut base and a concrete countertop. The only thing that was left to do was the drawers. It sat that way for over a year, but it’s finally finished. I was able to do all the drawer fronts out of one continuous piece of wood so that the grain pattern follows all the way across. It’s those little details that make me really like it the most. I opted to use no handles, but instead beveled the bottom edge of the drawer for a comfortable grip. I think it turned out pretty nice. It’s funny because I really love all the walnut in the bathroom, and very little of it was planned. The walnut behind the toilet was because we didn’t have enough wall space for the wall hung tank in the wall, and the walnut above the mirror is because they had to cut the mirror short to get it past the sink when installing it. In hindsight, I wouldn’t have done it any different.

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Our bathroom is almost completely done. We finally finished the vanity a couple months ago (more on that later) as well as installed the hand held shower wand (more on that too). All we have to do now is a little touch up paint, add a towel hook and a toilet paper holder. This one from Eva Solo caught my eye because it is very simple and I kinda like the way it sticks out of the wall. The roll is held in place by those spring loaded black parts. No idea on pricing yet as it is due to come out sometime this month along with their other new products, but how much could a toilet paper holder cost.

When we designed our bathroom we always planned on forgoing the standard bath mat in favor of a wooden one. We even placed an extra drain outside of the bathtub so that when you stood on a wooden bath mat the water wouldn’t just pool underneath. I had planned on making my own out of Ipe, but I have to admit I am tempted to just get this teak one from West Elm. I even love the matching stool.

Available from West Elm $89 - $129.

Sheetrock work began a few days ago. This is usually the mid-point in home construction. Since we have very little finish work required, i.e. no window or door trim, we feel like we are well past the mid-point. Sheetrock will wrap up tomorrow and preliminary steel posts for the stairs will be installed later this week. Doors were installed just before sheetrock. Garth found an awesome set of interior doors at a great price, less than $200.00 each! The remainder of the radiant system will be installed and the gypcrete floors will all be done by the end of next.
It took some time and negotiation but we finally have a solid game plan for the stairs (thanks to Kenner for the coordination). We are going with a clear varnish on the steel instead of paint. We chose square tubes and stainless steel cable for the railings. Greg with Premier Metal Works is constructing the stairs and rooftop railings.
For anyone wondering we chose the Kohler Purist series faucets for the upper floor bathrooms. For the first floor powder room we chose a “Vattern” compact cabinet/sink/faucet combo from Ikea.
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