bathroom-design / Green Building & Sustainable Home Renovation Information & Advice

Water and moisture wreak havoc on homes, affecting function, durability and our health. Given that kitchens and bathrooms are the main source of humidity, we need to put extra thought into designing these rooms so they consume less, last longer, and help us maintain healthier homes. Durable water resistant surfaces wil...

As the largest block of our population ages – the baby boomers – a quickly growing housing trend for home renovations is ‘age in place’ home modifications for seniors and anyone with mobility issues. Arguably the two most important areas of the home to determine how safe it is for a senior to live alone in their home, ...

Gray water recycling for toilets, how does it work? The Eco Bath concept is simple: use the waste water from the sink to flush the adjoining toilet. The execution is nothing less than stylish. Though compact, the Eco Bath’s water tank is comprised of two compartments, one that holds drainage water from the adjoining si...

Design basics for flexible housing: Depending on the stage you are at in your life, you might have kids, they might be gone or you might want to have some in the future. Design floor plans that work for you right now but can be easily adapted to accommodate different family dynamics in the future. Flexible housing star...

Should we consider adding a bidet? Although quite popular in Africa, Asia and Europe, the bidet has been slow to gain popularity in America.  Could it be that we are just creatures of habit? Does the idea of a jet of water blasting your nether regions seem a hard leap to make at first? Well, you’re probably not the on...

Are laminate counters good? Laminate countertops were a long-time staple of residential kitchen and bathroom construction, but they started to fall off in popularity around the time rockstars stopped wearing spandex, which was somewhere in the 80s. A trend started at that time towards alternatives to laminate counters,...

Why fix a leaky toilet flapper? Another of the jobs that sat on my Honey-Do-List for quite a while longer than I care to admit has been to fix the leaking toilet flapper in the bathroom at the cabin - made worse by us being off grid and only having a relatively small amount of water available in our outside rainwater c...

Why fix leaky faucets? One of the jobs that sat on my honey-do-list for quite a while longer than I care to admit has been to fix the leaky and dripping older-style faucet in the bathroom at the cabin - made worse by us being off grid and only having a finite amount of rainwater available in our outside catchment tank....

Toilets usually account for about a third of the indoor water use in a home, so toilets that carry the EPA WaterSense® label are a great place to start looking. Then comes the choice of either single flush or dual flush- it's a bit of a toss up but in the end we chose to go with single flush models, because when human ...

DIY video guide on how to lay tiles yourself We have finished the bathroom counter, floors and shower stalls with a dark slate tile. Slate is a natural stone, so its surfaces have more character and inconsistencies in texture - and at times in thickness - than manufactured tiles. This can mean a bit more effort on the ...

After recently posting a story sharing the brilliance that is the Swedish Orbsys water and heat recycling shower, it was brought to our attention that there is a homegrown Canadian variety as well. The EcoVéa shower by Reveeco is made in Quebec, Canada, and works based on the same principles as the Orbys we recently wr...