Breaking Through

Because the upstairs bathroom was still empty (we had yet to choose a tiler, or the tile), and we were living in the house, we had to have a working bathroom. So how to do you demolish some of the walls in the downstairs bathroom and build new ones while still keeping the current shower and other fixtures in place? Answer, you take out the walls the fixtures aren’t attached to, you build some of the new ones that you have the space for and leave the rest until the bathroom upstairs is completed.


Sorry I don’t have a better before picture of the master bathroom. This is looking into it from the master bedroom. As you can see we have taken out the closets that you passed by to enter the bathroom proper.


Here’s a view of the space where the closet on the other side used to be and the doorway coming in from the hall.


By incorporating the hallway space into the bathroom, we are making it more usable for us everyday rather than be helpful for the occasional guest.


Here’s what it is looking like from the other side. You can hopefully start getting a sense of the little entry area (all that will survive of the hallway) leading to the bedroom on the far left. You can see a sliver of light through into the bathroom, and to the right of the stepladder you can just see the wall opened between the hallway and the room next door (hereafter called my art studio which is what it will be).

From the above picture, you can see we have removed the studs from the new opening into the living room wall.


Now you see the studs (and what the entry from the bedroom into the bathroom looks like),


Now you don’t.
This picture also shows a nice new beam in place. In case you didn’t know it, every opening has to have a beam across it supporting what is above. This is a bearing wall so we are happy to give it all the support it needs (Go Wall).
At the bottom you can see signs of wallboard removal in the wall.

Meanwhile, down at the other end of the hallway (just a minute, let me get into position) we’d broke through into the art studio.


In case you are wondering… the purple colour is not staying.
The plan for here is to remove the studs and make a closet from the area just behind it. Because there is an electrical outlet in the section we have removed, we are going to have to re-route it to a part of the wall to the right. The building code insists on an outlet in every wall.

The art studio closet is being created from the hallway and the closet in the hallway.


This picture shows the space where the closet was. The pink ‘wall’ you can see is one side of the shower in the master bathroom.

Moving right along, we removed the studs from that opening between the hallway and the art studio and put in the required beam. At this stage, we haven’t had any inspections. Our first one will be what is called rough framing and we are quite a way away from being ready for that.

Having already taken up both carpet and carpet strip (my job) in the hallway, next to come out was the wallboard (apart from the small section opposite the new opening).


Another of Mrs. Remodel’s jobs was to remove all the nails in the studs left behind when the wallboard was pulled off. There are a lot of them. However, after proving myself capable of wielding a screwdriver (no mean feat when you started out as useless as I was/am at DIY) I was ready to wield something else. For the nail job, I got to handle a hammer AND a cat’s paw.

Removing the nails, taking out the closet fixtures, and cleaning up, is as close as I get to doing any demolition. Mr. Remodel, Mr. Fix-It, and Mr. Fix-It’s Helpers all expressed their glee in executing the demolition stage of a remodel project. I don’t see why they should have all the fun except that perhaps putting a sledgehammer or an electric saw in the hands of a DIY novice might not be the wisest action to take.

My least favourite job is sweeping up the dust. Because we are sleeping in the downstairs bedroom (we are in our 50’s and 60’s so close nighttime access to a bathroom is much appreciated), I have to sweep up all the dust made from the days work before we can clean up ourselves and then eat. Since Mr. Remodel works right up to the 6.30pm deadline for when noisy work must stop, we don’t get to eat until almost 9pm. But by then a lame microwave meal is so easy to do and eagerly anticipated.