Ensuite Renovations

An ensuite is not simply a smaller bathroom. It is a wet area that opens directly into a bedroom, and that single fact changes how it has to be designed, ventilated and built.

Ventilation is the first difference. Most ensuites have no window, so moisture has nowhere to go but into the adjoining bedroom — which is where you get peeling paint on the bedroom side of the wall, musty carpet, and mould in the wardrobe. A correctly sized, ducted exhaust fan vented to outside (not into the roof cavity) is not optional in an ensuite. Venting into a roof space simply relocates the damp problem into your ceiling.

Acoustics are the second. A toilet flushing three metres from a pillow carries. Insulating the common wall and choosing quieter cisterns and soft-close fittings makes a genuine difference to how liveable the room is, and it costs very little at rough-in stage compared with retrofitting later.

Most ensuites are between 3 and 5 square metres, so every centimetre is contested. Wall-hung vanities and concealed cisterns buy back visual floor space. A frameless screen and a single continuous tile through the shower makes the room read larger than a framed enclosure with a hob. Where space is very tight, a walk-in recess with a linear drain removes the need for a swing door entirely. The trade-off is that linear drains demand a more precise single-direction fall, so the screeding has to be right.