“Nobody . . . has designed a bathroom that you don’t have to blush when you walk into it,” stated the great American interior designer Elsie de Wolfe, in a conversation with Ludwig Bemelmans. “That monstrosity – the unspeakable porcelain fixture – even I haven’t been able to defeat it.” She was referring, of course, to the loo, aka the lavatory, lav, WC, toilet, john, bog, privy, potty, crapper – or, if you prefer, bathroom, cloakroom, little boys’ room (yuck), rest room, powder room - the sheer quantity of euphemisms suggesting that we still haven’t entirely recovered our blushes when it comes to acknowledging common nature. (There’s a school of thought that ‘loo’ derives from the French for place, ‘le lieu’ – and not, as is popularly believed, ‘gardez l’eau’, or ‘watch out for water’ – so there’s a lengthy history to this denial.) “You know, if anyone designed a decent-looking unspeakable, he would be terribly rich overnight,” Elsie continued. And “if all those functional designers can’t solve the problem, it would be almost better to go back to the outdoor plumbing of our fathers. That, at least, wasn’t part of the house.”
A century or so on, the appearance of the loo hasn’t changed significantly since Elsie’s heyday, and, judging from the number of bathrooms that feature in House & Garden where the loo is deliberately out of shot, we still aren’t overly keen on either its aesthetics, or its existence. So, what do we do? Should we be hiding it in a cupboard, and indeed within other furniture (Elsie put one in a Louis XIV cane chair)? Or should we, in contrast, be celebrating it? According to the World Toilet Organisation, the average person spends three years of their life sitting on the loo – we pay extra for ‘luxury’ cinema seats for a film that only lasts three hours. Evidently, we need to get over any lingering embarrassment, and give real thought to this most necessary of household fixtures.
Regarding the location, “I can’t bear bathrooms without loos in them,” says Olivia Outred. “Horribly impractical. What happens when your child needs an emergency wee during bathtime?” That said, “the loo, just like a telly, should not be the main feature of a room,” she continues, “and not directly opposite the door.” “I do think about views into bathrooms and where the loo should go so that it isn’t front and centre of every glimpse, as they aren’t usually the most attractive objects, and it is often not very easy to decorate around them to create beautiful scenes,” agrees Brandon Schubert.
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Martin Brudnizki is responsible for the interior design of cult night spot Annabel’s, which is home to the most Instagrammed loos in London, if not the world (it is notable, though, that the loos themselves never actually feature, it’s more about the floral backdrop and the gilded swan taps). He says that he will sometimes put the loo in a separate place, because “couples often spend time in the bathroom together, [so it’s not] so much for aesthetic reasons but for personal ones that I’d advise someone to try to section off part of the existing room.” It’s an approach that has been successfully employed by both Charlotte and Angus Buchanan of Buchanan Studio, who have created cabins in their bathroom for the shower and the loo, and Pallas Kalamotusis of Studio Krokalia.
However, there isn’t always room for an internal cabin, and while I have stripped a bathroom so that I can reposition the loo away from the open door, it’s not a budget option. (Nor have I yet reinstalled the bathroom – effectively, I allowed myself to be so upset by a loo that we’ve been one down for a year now – so let that be a cautionary tale.) “If it isn’t possible to place a loo out of the way, then I favour trying to make it look as nice as possible,” says Brandon. “That might involve using a concealed cistern with joinery around it, so that the focus is more on the shelves or panelling, or at least having a shelf behind the loo so you can put some nice things on top. Or, in more traditional interiors, we might use a high-level cistern with lovely pipework just so that it at least looks interesting rather than ordinary.”
Which brings us on to the actual aesthetics – and there are variants, insofar as there are more modern-looking loos, as well as the traditional type, with choice coming down to personal preference. Nicky Haslam has installed rather an elegant bespoke commode in his flat in London, proving it is possible to nicely disguise a loo, and include it in the bathroom, should you wish. When it comes to the standard, both Martin and Brandon state a leaning towards traditional fittings, “wooden seats and levers immediately soften what is otherwise a stark, shiny piece of hardware,” says Brandon, though Oliva is not keen on “cisterns placed high up above head height – it feels heavy and cumbersome and fussy.” Olivia also dislikes the wall-hung, ‘floating’ type of loo, “they make me feel nervous that my great weight will somehow snap it off the wall.” (She, and my ten-year old daughter, who once point-blank refused to use such a loo in a restaurant, “in case it breaks.”) But Brandon argues that “in more contemporary spaces, wall-hung WCs can be the right way to go. What bothers me about them,” he continues, “is the flush plates, which all feel incredibly cheaply made and seem to have been designed by the set designer from Star Wars.” (Flush plates being those buttons that you press.) He identifies Aquadomo as the place to find “lovely heavy brass options – I do wonder why more people don’t offer that type of thing.”
Of course, there have been some developments. Back when Kanye West and Kim Kardashian were still married, it was reported that they had splashed out $750,000 (£619,597.50) on four gold-plated toilets for their house (to which our response is only four?), rehabilitating them from their reputation as the loo of choice for Donald Trump and Middle-Eastern dictators (and Popes. John Paul I once confessed that his Vatican flush handle was studded with diamonds.) If you too think that seems utterly ridiculous, know that in 2016 the Italian artist Maurizio Cattelan created a gold loo, called it America, and plumbed it in at New York’s Guggenheim Museum – mirroring Duchamp’s Dada-ist urinal of 1917, and combining it with a magnificent gesture of contempt. It may be gold – but it’s still a bog, and it didn’t appear to do anything extra. (Incidentally it was stolen from an exhibition at Blenheim Palace in 2019, and still hasn’t resurfaced – it’s thought to have probably been melted down.) Either way, Brandon’s forthcoming planned acquisition seems a significantly better investment: “I am about to purchase a Japanese wonder-loo for my flat. It will bidet, sanitise, deodorise and air dry on command. I cannot wait.”
Ultimately, suggests, Martin, we need to treat the loo like any other “beautifully designed space – books and art are important to make it feel like the rest of the house, and not too utilitarian.” Maria Speake of Retrouvius often uses bold wallpapers in the loos she and her team designs, and notes that rich colours can make the room feel warmer, and more interesting. Returning to Elsie de Wolfe’s point, and her notions concerning ‘unspeakables’, the Guardian did, a couple of years ago, report on the unexpected rise of the outdoor composting toilet – but they’re not to everybody’s taste (and far from ideal in the midst of a cold winter.) Worth remembering was that Elsie was born in 1859, when decorum insisted that even piano legs were covered; these days, happily, the sight of a loo does not need to be a blush-worthy experience.
