Spa Like Bathroom – Elevate your Me Time

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Wondering how to make a spa like bathroom? Tired of your normal bathroom routine and ready to add some luxury to your life? Check out this “how to get a spa like bathroom” hit-list, and start pampering yourself. You can create a spa experience at home with these great bathroom ideas.

Why you should have a spa like bathroom

Having a spa like bathroom is more than just being able to post cute pics on Instagram. Having a spa like bathroom lets you pamper and treat yourself at home. Let’s face it, spa visits are expensive. Going to the spa is something that you would do as much as possible, if you could afford it. Having an at home spa lets you get the benefits of going to a spa – relaxation and an exquisite experience – without all of the cost. You deserve to be able to have a place to relax and pamper yourself. Check out these tips and turn your master bathroom into a spa experience.

What you need for a spa-like bathroom:

Steps to a Spa-like bathroom
Get a spa-like bathroom like this with these steps.

Getting a Spa Like Bathroom in 8 steps

Step 1 – Cleanliness

The first step in getting a spa-like bathroom is cleanliness.

Have you ever been to a dirty spa? No. If the spa was dirty, what would you do? Hopefully run, very far, very fast.

So the first step in getting a spa like bathroom is to get your bathroom clean. You’ll want to start by clearing out the clutter. In order to have a truly spa-like bathroom, you’ll want to start with a clean base to see what you have to work with. So get all the stuff out of your bathroom.

Once your bathroom is empty, then start scrubbing. Start with the things that are higher up – light fixtures that need dusting and walls that need washing. Work your way slowly downwards cleaning the floor last. This makes it so that as you clean your bathroom, you do not re-dirty an area that was just cleaned. You should be sure to get the mirrors and light fixtures, bathroom counters, tub and shower, the toilet, and the floor all clean. Cleanliness is a huge factor in having a relaxing spa like bathroom. You don’t want to be sitting in the tub examining the dirty soap ring around it – you want to be relaxing!

After your bathroom has been scrubbed clean, start examining the stuff you hauled out of your bathroom. Ask yourself if you like the items, and if they are supporting you in your goal of having a spa-like bathroom. Some things like the toilet scrubber don’t add to the experience, but you sure want to have it nearby. Make sure you decide if those items are really serving you – be it in beauty or function. If they do not serve your goal of beauty or have a definite function, toss them! If you can’t bear to throw them away because you might need them “some day”, think about storing them in a different location that it out of sight.

I bet your bathroom already feels better.

Step 2 – Color

Clean, plain white bathroom.
Make your vanilla bathroom more spa-like with color.

Before you start adding a bunch of new things into your bathroom, I want you to step back and look at it again.

You just cleaned it all, and made sure that everything in your bathroom was either something that you found beautiful or useful.

Now, I want you to examine your bathroom for color. Do you like the color of your bathroom? What about the color of your towels? Is it a color that you find soothing and comforting?

Color is such a huge part in our human psychology. Your relaxing, spa-like bathroom should have colors in it that you enjoy and find soothing. Clean whites, soothing blue-greys, warm roses, and dusty browns all work well for this. House Beautiful has a great article here on picking calming paint colors.

Take a look at your bathroom and your things and think about the colors, and what colors you want to use. Maybe you love something or find it super useful but color wise it is jarring. Can you find a different version of the object that isn’t so offensive or hide the object out of sight? Once you decide on a color scheme that you like for your bathroom, it’s easier to find design ideas for a master bath that can help you. Having a color scheme also means that it’s easier to make everything match and play together nicely.

Make sure that while you are thinking about color, you look at the lighting in your bathroom. Many master bathrooms do not have very good natural light. Make sure that any colors that you pick will play nicely with the lighting in your bathroom. Remember, you can also change out the color of your light bulbs to a warmer or cooler color to work better with the feel of your bathroom.

Step 3 – Soothing Scents

The next step in getting a spa like environment in your bathroom is to incorporate some soothing scents. No one wants their spa to smell like, well, a bathroom. There are a couple of different ways that you can incorporate relaxing scents into your relaxing bathroom. You could even combine two or three of these to get the coverage that you need.

Candles are a good option to add relaxing smells into your bathroom. You can leave the candles around for an amazing background scent, then burn them while you are soaking in the tub for some extra luxury. Having candles in your spa bathroom decor gives you both added beauty and amazing scents.

If you want to forgo candles, another good option for a spa look bathroom is to add an essential oil diffuser. These work by you adding some water and a couple of drops of your favorite essential oil to a reservoir. You turn the machine on, and it starts to emit a wonderfully scented trail of water vapor. Using an essential oil diffuser allows you to pick your favorite essential oil for relaxing to. Lavender and roman chamomile are both good choices, but maybe you prefer jasmine instead. With an essential oil diffuser you are only limited to the combination of oils that you choose.

If you do not want to remember to light candles or to add drops of essential oils to a diffuser, another great option to bring relaxing scents into your bathroom is to use a plug in diffuser. A plug in diffuser works similarly to the essential oil diffuser – it emits scents of your choosing. The difference being that a plug in diffuser is always working – you do not have to set it up and turn it on. There are a number of different plug in diffusers available these days, as well as hundreds of scents. So there is going to be one that works for you.

Step 4 – Bring Nature Indoors

How to get a spa like bathroom - add plants!
Get a more spa like bathroom by adding plants!

Adding plants to your bathroom can help make it feel more spa-like.

Bathrooms are very moisture rich environments. Plants that you pick for this area should be able to tolerate the lighting conditions as well as high humidity. This is not the best place for your cactus succulents!

Some plants that do excellent in high humidity and low light are:

  • Orchids
  • Spider Plants
  • Devil’s Ivy
  • Bamboo
  • Begonia
  • Air Plants
  • Cast Iron Plant
  • Bromeliad
  • Snake Plants
  • …. or fake plants! Check them out on Amazon here.

Be sure to check out my post about cute plant pots to find the perfect pot to put your plants into.

Step 5 – Add Some More Nature

You will want to add more nature to your bathroom after adding plants. Natural wood elements and touches of rock help ground out a space. Touching wood has also been found to increase relaxation in this study. So go ahead, add some rock and wood touches to help you relax.

When picking wood for your bathroom, you will want to make sure that your selections can handle all of the water. The added humidity in a bathroom can cause most wood to swell up. This swelling causes the wood grain to come out, and the wood to feel rough. Repeated swelling and drying can cause wood items to crack and warp.

If you can afford it, splurge on wood items made of teak. Teak wood is really resistant to water and is the ‘gold standard’ of wood for items in the bathroom. If you cannot afford teak, cedar is another great choice for wood items in the bathroom.

Some great ideas for incorporating rock and wood into your spa-like bathroom are:

  • Wooden shower stool
  • Wooden table near the tub for keeping items dry
  • Wooden floor mat
  • River rock floor mat
  • River rock “tile” shower floor
  • Rock accent wall
  • Wood accent wall
  • Rock tub trim

Step 6 – Relaxing Sounds

When you walk into a relaxing spa, you are greeted by soothing music. This is one of the key qualities that you will want to replicate if you want to make your bathroom truly spa-like.

You can accomplish this with a simple relaxing playlist on your phone. Some great ideas for music to pick from includes:

  • The babbling of streams flowing
  • The lapping of waves against a shore
  • The flutter of tree leaves stirred by a breeze
  • The gentle ringing of singing bowls
  • The dampening the outside world with white noise

Phone audio can be lacking and honestly – who wants to risk dropping their phone in the water adjusting volume? You might want to splurge here and get a blue tooth speaker that integrates with your smart assistant of choice; Google or Alexa. This way you can soak in the tub and adjust the volume or song that is playing without the risk of dropping your phone in.

Some excellent Bluetooth speakers to choose from include:

  • This waterproof model
  • This long lasting charge model
  • This compact model that cold be hidden out of site

Step 7 – Luxuries

Spas are known for their pampering qualities. What better way to pamper yourself than with luxury?

Luxuries for your spa like bathroom come in two categories – fixed use, and unlimited use. Unlimited use items are things like bath towels, floor mats, and bath pillows. You can use these items indefinitely so long as they are still in good condition. In general, you will want to invest more in the unlimited use luxuries. These items will continue to be used years after you purchase them – so it makes sense to buy quality! Some good ideas of things to invest in for unlimited use are:

  • Bath towels – I prefer overly large like these ones here
  • Bath mat – A bath floor mat is a great chance to put something fluffy in, or a touch of wood.
  • Bath pillow – Bath pillows are the ultimate luxury in the tub. They’re inexpensive but add so much in comfort.
  • Bath overflow valve cover – A bath overflow valve cover like this adds an extra 3″ of water to your tub. It doesn’t seem like much – but it’s life changing.
  • Bath shelf – Shelves in the bathroom are a necessity. You should have a good mix of wall mounted shelves and small tables for storing items.
  • Mirrors – You stare at yourself in this frame every day. Pick an amazing frame for yourself like this one here.
  • Sink and tub fixtures – Upgraded bath fixtures can make an area feel more special.
  • A rain shower head – This one on Amazon is super highly rated and reasonably priced
  • Heated flooring – Heated flooring is super amazing, but you’ll need a contractor to help you with it
  • Hair turban – Not having wet hair dripping down your back is awesome. Check out this hair turban on Amazon.
  • Fluffy robe – There’s nothing like a warm, fluffy robe on a cold day.

Step 8 – Pampering treats

Lotion bars
This DIY lotion bar recipe makes a great, pampering treat after relaxing.

Things like bath bombs, candles, and bubble bath are fixed use. These are amazing pampering treats, but unlike the luxuries above you need to restock them occasionally. You can only use them so many times before they are ‘used up’ and you need to buy more.

Some ideas for pampering treats that you can buy or DIY are:

Now that you have your spa like bathroom…

Relax and enjoy. You deserve it. 😊

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