Renovations can create the bathroom you’ve always dreamed of, but if you have a passion for the most modern design, is it possible to skip the baseboards to keep the layout smooth?
You don’t need baseboards in a bathroom if the finish of the space is very well done. Baseboards provide a tight connection between the wall and the floor and are the best option, but if the room construction is nearly flawless, you can do without them.
For your average home renovation or construction job, baseboards in the bathroom are the best way to ensure the longevity of the space. In the following article, we will examine why baseboards are important for your bathroom and in what situations you may be able to do without them.
Contents
- 1 What do baseboards do?
- 2 Defend the structure against water damage
- 3 Cover up uneven walls
- 4 Protect your walls from dents and stains
- 5 Defend the construction of your home
- 6 Compensate for the bending of hardwood
- 7 Why do you need baseboards in the bathroom?
- 8 Do you need to seal baseboards in a bathroom?
- 9 When can you skip baseboards in the bathroom?
What do baseboards do?
Baseboards are a multifunctional finishing element of your home. They fulfill the requirements of many situations in your house, especially in your damp bathroom. Let’s take a final look at some of the baseboards, from warding off dents to preventing moisture penetration. Features.
Defend the structure against water damage
The walls in your home are made of drywall. This is a structure of fiber-mixed gypsum that forms a lightweight but efficient wall element. However, the mixture is susceptible to damage from many external influences, including water.
When water collects on the floor of your bathroom and then comes into contact with the drywall, it can not only cause extreme damage to the wall’s visual finish, but also its structural integrity. Drywall walls can withstand small amounts of surface water, but they are not designed to withstand prolonged exposure to moisture.
A baseboard serves as protection for the drywall. It sits at the corner of the floor and the wall, providing a durable barrier against pooling. Baseboards are also much easier and cheaper to replace than drywall walls, so even if the baseboards get damaged, you can work on the buffer piece rather than repairing the actual wall.
When a drywall wall is damaged, it’s not just the wet area that is affected. Moisture quickly seeps further and can damage the wall several feet high.
Cover up uneven walls
A wall should be built at a perfect 90-degree angle. However, mistakes happen. Even if you think your walls sit at a flawless corner, they might be at an obtuse or acute angle if you were to measure them.
Having a baseboard to cushion the edge between the floor and the wall will help hide the awkward angle that can occur between the two surfaces. Having a direct floor-to-wall connection with an inaccurate angle would be quite easy to notice, but the baseboard acts as a kind of boundary line, an area that allows for margin of error.
Protect your walls from dents and stains
Baseboards act as a kind of bumper guard for your walls. They protect the drywall from coming into contact with vacuum cleaners, mops, dropped items, stepped-on toys, and spills on the floor. When repeatedly cleaning your bathroom floor, there is likely to be increased knocking of the broom or vacuum cleaner against the walls.
Baseboards can protect your walls from these dents and stains from used cleaning agents or spilled products.
Defend the construction of your home
By running a baseboard along the edge of the floor and the wall, you give a potentially vulnerable area of your home a reliable finish. If the floor and wall are not built in perfectly continuous 90-degree angles, gaps will appear between the two surfaces.
A gap between your bathroom floor and the wall creates a space for dirt and debris to hide. The accumulation of these two things can lead to warping, discoloration, and other expensive damages in the space.
By having a baseboard that covers these uneven cracks, dirt and debris have nowhere to go, and you can easily sweep or vacuum up the stray dirt.
Compensate for the bending of hardwood
Hardwood flooring is a timeless classic when it comes to designing your home. However, these lifelike floors tend to bend and breathe, just like their living counterparts.
Hardwood floors can contract and expand depending on the environment of the material. High heat and humidity can cause the hardwood to swell, while cool, dry temperatures can put the material on a constricting edge.
When hardwood floors swell and contract, the edges of the floors also move. If the floors of your bathroom snugly align with the wall in the summer, they might shrink away from the corner in the winter.
A baseboard protects your wall covering from these highs and lows, providing a consistent seal between the walls’ two surfaces regardless of the temperature.
Why do you need baseboards in the bathroom?
Baseboards are especially important in the bathroom due to the humidity of the space. As we have learned so far, the temperature, humidity, and climate of the bathroom determine the materials. Condition. A bathroom is exposed to a lot of moisture throughout its life, so baseboards can protect the walls from mold, mildew, and stains.
Do you need to seal baseboards in a bathroom?
If you are dealing with baseboards in a bathroom, then caulking is a necessary step. The caulk forms an efficient water-resistant and sealing layer around the edge of the room, giving the baseboards the best possible chance of protecting your walls from moisture damage.
Tip: While baseboards protect drywall walls, sealing protects baseboards.
When can you skip baseboards in the bathroom?
If you don’t like the look of baseboards in the bathroom, then there are certain situations in which you can skip them. While baseboards are typically recommended, if you want to avoid them, you should construct your bathroom walls and floors out of tiles.
Tile floors and walls also need to be structured in a near-flawless 90-degree angle, but having tile on both surfaces adds a little more leeway. The tile adds a few millimeters of buffer to each surface, enough that the corner, when paired with a sealing line, gets all the benefits mentioned above.
A thorough sealing line where the wall meets the floor can achieve the following:
- Make the space waterproof
- Protect interior structures from dirt and debris
- Allow for the bending of both features
- Preserve the integrity of the tile
- Create a smooth transition from floor to wall
If you tile both the walls and floors of your bathroom, you may be able to do without baseboards. But even those who fully tile their bathrooms opt for baseboards. They simply choose ones that match their decor.
For most tile, especially those commonly used on floors, you can find matching baseboards that seamlessly match your tiles. These baseboards fit perfectly into your design scheme, creating a flawless transition from floor to wall while providing the protection of a traditional baseboard. If you don’t need baseboards in your bathroom, consider the following:
- Do you have a fully tiled bathroom?
- Are your walls and floors at right angles?
- Can you afford to constantly renovate your bathroom?
- Do you know how to repair drywall walls yourself?
- Do baseboards really have a negative impact on your home?
If you answered no to two or more of the above questions, you should have a good idea of how you can do without baseboards—most bathrooms benefit greatly from them, and unless you have a specific reason why you don’t like them, they are worth their price.