Bathrooms

Bathroom is one of the most important rooms in one's house. It's the first room you visit in the morning and the last room you visit before hitting the bed. For quite a few of us it is not just a place where we get done with our daily ablutions. It is a place where we sit in peace and quiet, far from the madding crowd, relax, let our inhibitions go (the breed of bathroom singers will vouch for it), reflect on the day passed by and dream. People have been known to have well stacked libraries in their bathroom; and lets not forget the famous "Eureka Eureka" anecdote about Archimedes.

Unfortunately, for most Indian homes, a bathroom is a wet place where you go to do your unmentionables and as soon as you get out of it, you close the door to it and keep that icky place out of sight, out of mind. On top of it, the bigger our cities are getting, the smaller the size of the bathrooms.

Speaking about Mumbai, bathrooms are becoming smaller with every passing year. I am not even going to talk about the millions who share a community bathroom or just use the railway tracks and roadsides. But there is a section of developers and individuals who have begun the 'beautiful bathrooms' revolution in India. People are splurging as much on their bathrooms as on any other room. Some of the houses in Mumbai have spent enough money on the bathrooms to buy a 3 bhk apartment in one of the suburbs.

Some may think, is it possible to spend so much on bathrooms? I myself was surprised when I did some research before going for my first interview. I visited a large bathroom products showroom in Vile Parle and was socked out of my senses when the salesman over there told me that the cute round bottomed water closet (toilet or wc) that I was admiring would cost me just 28500 Rs. Since then I have seen much but for a management trainee who was merely surviving on a paltry stipend, a toilet worth 28500 was plain insane.

Truth is there are large business empires with turnovers in billions of dollars spending fortunes on developing new products for bathrooms every year. Countries like Germany, Italy, USA, Japan & Spain are house to hundreds of large corporations making toilets, taps, showers, bathtubs, whirlpools, tiles and several other products for bathrooms. Product designers and high profile design studios spend hundreds of precious manhours working on product designs for these companies.

There is a new breed of developers in Mumbai which is paying more attention to the bathrooms. This change has been brought about in the last few years and can be seen in the form of slightly larger bathrooms, imported fixtures and fittings and the introduction of powder rooms. A typical 3 bhk and upwards apartment will have a powder room, and three other bathrooms. The master bathroom may have a bathtub or even a whirlpool in it. For me personally as well as professionally it is a welcome change.

In my posts I will be talking mainly about the various wonderful products available in the market. So, stay tuned.

P.S. Picture courtesy Villeroy & Boch; product featured - Subway Toilet & Washbasins