How do I make a small bathroom look bigger?
Show more floor and more light: wall-hung basin and WC so the floor runs unbroken to the walls, one large mirror instead of a small cabinet door, large-format light tiles with matching grout, glass panels instead of framed enclosures, and layered lighting. The floor visible at the room's edges does more than any paint colour.
The eye reads a room's size from its floor plane and its light. Everything that interrupts the floor — pedestals, boxed pipes, shower trays, furniture feet — shrinks the room; everything that bounces light — mirrors, gloss tiles, glass — grows it. Small-bathroom design is mostly the discipline of applying those two rules everywhere.
The specific moves, in rough order of impact per pound: wall-hung WC and basin (concealed cisterns earn their cost here); a mirror the full width of the basin wall; large-format tiles (600×300 up) with grout coloured to match so surfaces read as planes; a walk-in glass panel instead of a framed cubicle; tiling the floor diagonally or running plank-format tiles the room's long way; and three layers of light rather than one centre spot.
What not to do: small tiles with contrasting grout (a grid shrinks walls), dark floors with light walls (chops the room in half), bulky furniture ranges designed for suburban en-suites, and shower curtains — in a small room a curtain is a wall. None of the effective moves cost much when the room is being renovated anyway; they are choices, not add-ons.
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