Of all the rooms in your home, the bathroom is the one room where everyone needs absolute privacy. From the master bath behind your bedroom to the downstairs powder room, we all want to take care of our most personal business in private. Unfortunately, not all homes are designed to provide that privacy.
Maybe your bathroom is all tile and hard-wood, echoing every little cabinet, shower, and toilet sound made inside. Or maybe your home ventilation inconveniently channels bathroom noise into other rooms of the house. You might even be working with a bathroom window situation. Whatever the issue, today we're here to help you deal with that bathroom noise once and for all.
Without further ado, here are seven of the best bathroom noise solutions available to homeowners, renters, and guests.
1) Bath Mats
Sound moves through solid objects, echoes off hard surfaces, and can resonate through wood. But it is absorbed by soft and textured things. Many bathrooms with sound problems are simply too echoey in the tiled and paneled space. You can reduce some of the noise both inside and outside the bathroom with a few additional soft items such as a bath mat by the toilet, sink or bathtub.
2) Paintings and Plants
Along the same lines, anything you can do to break up sound travel inside the upper space of the bathroom can be very effective. You might not realise it, but many people hang paintings or embroidery on their bathroom walls to absorb sounds before they travel to the rest of the house.
Plants are also great at catching sounds as they travel through the middle spaces, and you can even add a very on trend plant hanger, providing style and life at the same time.
3) Upgrade or Install an Exhaust Fan
The single greatest bathroom invention since the flush toilet is the exhaust fan. Not all bathrooms have one. Not all bathrooms have an exhaust fan that still works. But you should. The exhaust fan not only takes shower steam and bad smells out of the bathroom, it's also a great source of white noise.
White noise creates a passive cover-sound for bathroom noises. Smaller sounds are lost in the gentle noise so that you don't have to worry about people outside the bathroom guessing what you are up to. The bathroom fan can also help reduce intense echoing inside the bathroom.
If you have a bathroom fan, consider getting it cleaned and repaired to improve its performance. If you don't have a bathroom fan, look for fans that can be mounted like an AC unit in your bathroom window.
4) Shelves and Shelf Liners
Another interesting way to deal with noises is with shelves or to look at open bathroom vanities. Shelves break up the open area that carries noise and can act as a barrier. However, if you find that your bathroom shelves are resonating and carrying noise instead, there is another simple solution.
Shelf liners. Slightly soft shelf liners will reduce the resonation of wood and plastic shelves, helping your shelves resist rather than carry bathroom noise. You can also simply fill your shelves up with towels. Towels are excellent noise-stoppers. Which leads us to the next point.
5) Towel Hanging Racks
Technically, stacking towels inside a cabinet is the least sound-resistant way to use them. Having a towel hanging on any available towel rails can help reduce noise in your bathroom by a surprising amount, and you can even do better than that.
If you have always wanted a hanging towel warmer or a fancy ladder-style towel rack, your noisy bathroom is the perfect place to put it. Hanging a few layered towels in the bathroom can really help you absorb bathroom noises and reduce how much that sound carries outside the bathroom.
6) Door Draft Stopper
Sometimes, bathroom noise issues are caused by how the floor was built. If your bathroom shares a continuous hardwood or tile floor with the room outside, chances are you're getting a lot of sound traveling under the door itself. That space under the door that allows the door to swing smoothly is also allowing sound to escape.
If this is your problem, the solution is a soft draft stopper. These are cloth tubes or double-tubes that slip under the bottom of a door. If done correctly, the door will close just as easily, but with cloth padding on either side of the gap to keep noises (and cold drafts) from coming through.
7) Soft Bathroom Radio
Finally, when all else fails, you can install a little bathroom or hanging shower radio. The purpose is to provide cover noise for anyone who needs audio privacy inside. And to provide some enjoyable jams for your morning and bedtime routines. Set up a small radio in your bathroom that can play soft music when someone is inside. Leave it on an easy listening channel or an enjoyable playlist if you use an MP3 device instead. Mention the radio to your guests and don't be surprised if they thank you for the additional privacy later on.
A noisy bathroom may be inconvenient, but you are not helpless to the architecture of your home. By combining your decor with noise management and cover sounds, you can create the privacy both you and your guests will so greatly appreciate.
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Visit our wholesale bathroom showrooms in Flemington or Fawkner for personalised advice on your bathroom design.
