Large and small in perfect balance. The interplay of proportions between the elements chosen to tell the story of the laborious design process to adapt a bathroom to new demands of life.
Very often, when renovating a small or medium-sized flat, the biggest challenge relates in adapting old spaces to new requirements of modern life.
Much of the housing stock in our cities dates back to the 1960s and 1970s and is characterised by the classic division into rooms, connected by a network of corridors and hallways. This network very often results in waste of precious space that could be productively used, especially if combined with service areas tailored to the nearest centimetre and penalised by an excessive congestion of elements and functions.
The service bathroom (or secondary) in such a flat is exactly what I transformed and adapted to the needs of my family of two big ones and three small ones. For the first time, I was able to dedicate myself to my own home after so many years of designing beautiful homes for my clients: the project, developed in collaboration with Samuele, my partner and expert in mechanical systems, required a strong effort but, when the building site was completed, it made me love the new spaces in a way I could never imagined.
Mina, as a partner of the renovation, offered me technical and emotional support throughout the design and implementation process that, starting with the first ideas written down in pencil on a paper, now translates into a reality in which materials – and stainless steel in particular – can tell the story of the beauty of things made with care.
|| The eternal struggle for the nearest centimetre characterises every bathroom project worthy of the name.
When I began to rethink our old bathroom, which is now used mostly by my children, one of the first ideas that came to mind was: why not transposing the search for perfect dimensional and functional balance into a sort of game of proportions, declared through an ad hoc choice of furnishing elements, sanitary ware and taps?
In short, why do not leave a visible trace of the laborious process of cutting and stitching together the centimetres to be allocated to the washbasin area, the sanitary area and the functional block of the shower and laundry corner?
Having made this design decision and being aware of the important implications it would have on the style and overall aesthetics of the bathroom, I set about carefully searching for the most suitable elements to put it into practice. I endless leafed through the catalogues of many manufacturers of sanitary ware and bathroom furnishing solutions and I fell under the most classic of lightning strikes: a collection of small coloured sanitary ware with full, rounded shapes, perfect for realising the idea of play that I had in mind.
But what kind of Mina tapware should be combined with sanitary ware and a washbasin of this type to emphasise the leap in scale and compare the two parallel worlds of large and small?
I had a clear idea of what I wanted, but I had absolutely no idea that it was already there waiting for me in the Mina bathroom catalogue, beautiful in its perfect stainless-steel design: the Dimensione 74 collection!
The concealed wall-mounted mixers in this collection are available for both the washbasin and shower area (in the surface-mounted version, also for the bathtub, which I decided not to include in my new bathroom for sheer lack of space however). Moreover, the concealed wall-mounted mixers have an unusual and surprising feature linked precisely to the size factor
Their diameter is 74 mm and, once installed on the wall, they are a sort of pure stainless-steel stud, capable of collaborating with the other functional and aesthetic elements of the bathroom in defining the overall design.
As for the washbasin, the spout combined with the mixer also has a large diameter: a good 34 mm, for a length that, in the company, can be calibrated to measure according to the depth of the washbasin and its installation characteristics (overtop, semi-recessed like mine, fully recessed in the cabinet top).
In the shower area, which, together with the laundry/housework area, entirely occupies the long wall just opposite the washbasin of my new bathroom, the concealed wall-mounted mixer from the Dimensione 74 collection finds company: that of the diverter between the hand shower and the shower head, characterised by a similar design and identical diameter, and that of the hand shower itself, minimal in form and therefore perfectly matching the tapware without causing unpleasant contrasts.
|| Tailor-made solutions also for taps
For the sanitary area, Mina’s know-how came to my aid in solving a specific need: recalling the design of the elements of the Dimensione 74 collection in a smaller tapware element, namely the bidet mixer. This was made possible by creating a made-to-measure mixer, designed from the Corsivo collection and varied in some dimensional details.
Finally, next to the WC there is a must-have item that I will include in all the renovation projects I undertake for my customers from now on: the stainless-steel water jet understood as the technological replacement for the traditional toilet brush. The double-locking mechanism is user friendly and safe even for children, without the floor and walls being affected by unwanted jets of water. What is more, it solves the annoying task of replacing the toilet brush once and for all while also ensuring greater hygiene.
Up to this point I have talked about the game of jumping in scale and size, limiting myself to a few hints about the materials in my new bathroom. In drawing up the project I have tried to respect a coherence which always brings me excellent results from a formal point of view, especially when applied to small spaces.
I assigned each function a material that would make it recognisable not only in this bathroom, but also in all the other rooms in the house.
The plates and switches of the electrical system, for example, were given matt black, while I dressed all the water elements in Mina stainless steel. This allowed me to trace a sort of common thread through all the rooms in the flat, creating a harmonious and coherent overall design.
For this project Nora | Design-outfit has chosen:
My name is Nora Santonastaso. I live and work in Rome as an architect. My projects focus on enhancing the spaces in the home, a space to which I also devote the stories that populate the pages of my blog, design outfit, active since 2013.
RENOVATING THE BATHROOM TO THE NEAREST CENTIMETRE: THE HOUSE OF DESIGNOUTFIT
by Nora Santonastaso
Large and small in perfect balance. The interplay of proportions between the elements chosen to tell the story of the laborious design process to adapt a bathroom to new demands of life.
Much of the housing stock in our cities dates back to the 1960s and 1970s and is characterised by the classic division into rooms, connected by a network of corridors and hallways. This network very often results in waste of precious space that could be productively used, especially if combined with service areas tailored to the nearest centimetre and penalised by an excessive congestion of elements and functions.
The service bathroom (or secondary) in such a flat is exactly what I transformed and adapted to the needs of my family of two big ones and three small ones. For the first time, I was able to dedicate myself to my own home after so many years of designing beautiful homes for my clients: the project, developed in collaboration with Samuele, my partner and expert in mechanical systems, required a strong effort but, when the building site was completed, it made me love the new spaces in a way I could never imagined.
Mina, as a partner of the renovation, offered me technical and emotional support throughout the design and implementation process that, starting with the first ideas written down in pencil on a paper, now translates into a reality in which materials – and stainless steel in particular – can tell the story of the beauty of things made with care.
In short, why do not leave a visible trace of the laborious process of cutting and stitching together the centimetres to be allocated to the washbasin area, the sanitary area and the functional block of the shower and laundry corner?
Having made this design decision and being aware of the important implications it would have on the style and overall aesthetics of the bathroom, I set about carefully searching for the most suitable elements to put it into practice. I endless leafed through the catalogues of many manufacturers of sanitary ware and bathroom furnishing solutions and I fell under the most classic of lightning strikes: a collection of small coloured sanitary ware with full, rounded shapes, perfect for realising the idea of play that I had in mind.
But what kind of Mina tapware should be combined with sanitary ware and a washbasin of this type to emphasise the leap in scale and compare the two parallel worlds of large and small?
I had a clear idea of what I wanted, but I had absolutely no idea that it was already there waiting for me in the Mina bathroom catalogue, beautiful in its perfect stainless-steel design: the Dimensione 74 collection!
Their diameter is 74 mm and, once installed on the wall, they are a sort of pure stainless-steel stud, capable of collaborating with the other functional and aesthetic elements of the bathroom in defining the overall design.
As for the washbasin, the spout combined with the mixer also has a large diameter: a good 34 mm, for a length that, in the company, can be calibrated to measure according to the depth of the washbasin and its installation characteristics (overtop, semi-recessed like mine, fully recessed in the cabinet top).
In the shower area, which, together with the laundry/housework area, entirely occupies the long wall just opposite the washbasin of my new bathroom, the concealed wall-mounted mixer from the Dimensione 74 collection finds company: that of the diverter between the hand shower and the shower head, characterised by a similar design and identical diameter, and that of the hand shower itself, minimal in form and therefore perfectly matching the tapware without causing unpleasant contrasts.
For the sanitary area, Mina’s know-how came to my aid in solving a specific need: recalling the design of the elements of the Dimensione 74 collection in a smaller tapware element, namely the bidet mixer. This was made possible by creating a made-to-measure mixer, designed from the Corsivo collection and varied in some dimensional details.
Finally, next to the WC there is a must-have item that I will include in all the renovation projects I undertake for my customers from now on: the stainless-steel water jet understood as the technological replacement for the traditional toilet brush. The double-locking mechanism is user friendly and safe even for children, without the floor and walls being affected by unwanted jets of water. What is more, it solves the annoying task of replacing the toilet brush once and for all while also ensuring greater hygiene.
Up to this point I have talked about the game of jumping in scale and size, limiting myself to a few hints about the materials in my new bathroom. In drawing up the project I have tried to respect a coherence which always brings me excellent results from a formal point of view, especially when applied to small spaces.
I assigned each function a material that would make it recognisable not only in this bathroom, but also in all the other rooms in the house.
The plates and switches of the electrical system, for example, were given matt black, while I dressed all the water elements in Mina stainless steel. This allowed me to trace a sort of common thread through all the rooms in the flat, creating a harmonious and coherent overall design.
For this project Nora | Design-outfit has chosen:
DIMENSIONE74 | 5152 – 6234
Wall mounted mixer set with spout Ø34 – stainless steel AISI 316 L. Custom length spout.
CORSIVO | 11509 customized
Deck mounted bidet mixer with customized handle.
DIMENSIONE74 | 5900
Wall mounted bath mixer and diverter set 2 ways – stainless steel AISI 316 L.
COMPLEMENTS HAND SHOWERSÂ | 045
Wall mounted water connection with support for hand shower – stainless steel AISI 316 L.
TYPHA | 0500
Stainless steel hand shower with connections 1/2″ and soft nipples.
SOFFIONE | 200H8
Inspectable and adjustable shower head Ø200 H.8 mm, with soft nipples – stainless steel AISI 316 L
FINE | F400
Horizontal arm for shower head L.400 – stainless steel AISI 316 L
EMME | PL250
Wc flush plate for dual cisterns – stainless steel AISI 316 L
COMPLEMENTS| 05143–0900–55100
Wall mounted water connection with shut-off WC hand spray and bracket