Painted Bathroom Tile
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Yes, you CAN paint bathroom tile!
A little over a year ago I showed you how we transformed the boys’ bathroom with white paint. It has held up perfectly to regular use over the last 18 moths or so! See the before and afters here. (UPDATE: has held up now for almost 3 years)
Since that went so well, I took to the hall bathroom as well! With four and a half bathrooms original to the late 50’s, paint is the most economical way to make a change–that’s for sure.
Now don’t get me wrong, I really like a lot of MCM trends left as they are. In the bathroom, I do like the 4×4 square tile that usually runs halfway up the wall. I like the layouts and especially enjoy those little built in tissue and toothbrush holders.
But at the end of the day, my love for Mid Century Modern design doesn’t always mean that I love 100% original 60-year-old bathrooms. I really wasn’t feeling the tan/cream/bisque tiles!
The good news is, you don’t need to gut something or stray from it’s original design in order to spruce it up a bit. We have found that white walls and white tile make for a really nice modernization of the space. Although, you could paint it any color you like!
I know some people are absolutely cringing over this and I can understand that. The thing is–I LOVE our crisp white painted tile!
Both of these bathroom updates were accomplished by using Rustoleum High Performance Protective Enamel 
To make this happen I simply deep cleaned and dried the tile, primed with a Rustoleum primer, then painted on the high gloss enamel. It goes on with visible brush strokes, but it’s very thick and it once it dries the brush strokes sort of settle out into a smooth hard solid coat.
I am super impressed with how it’s help up in the boys’ bathroom, and since this is a guest shower that is hardly ever used, I decided it was definitely a candidate for paint.
Many people want to know how you clean painted bathroom tile.
You don’t really have to baby it too much. I clean it with a rag and shower cleaner with no problems. (I just wouldn’t take an abrasive pad to it.)
Here are the before and after shots (okay more like during and after shots…whoops!) of the hall bathroom. The before was just a tad dark and needed a refresh!
Even with my shadow-y and dark photography skills, I think you can see how much brighter it is. All in all I’m so happy with the updates to our bathrooms.
And even though I know (I know!) painting over original tile may feel downright sinful to some people, it worked for us.
I’m calling this a Mid Century Monday post because although we changed the color, we didn’t gut the bathroom with some upgrade that didn’t flow with the rest of the house. We are happy with our bright, white MCM bathroom refresh!
