Outdated Bathroom Before and After

Adjoined to the guest room, this guest bath feels outdated, detached, and very busy. 

Before

After

New accessories were purchased in rich warm colors that now coordinate with the adjacent guest room decor. The simple yet much more sophisticated decor help the buyer connect with and "see" the room.

You certainly updated this bathroom by a couple of decades. 

But, tell me about the pillows on the floor?

Thank you, the room tied in beautifully to the attached guest room.  There was a small chair against the wall that did not fit in the photo where the pillows resided.  They were just moved into the shot by the homeowner who actuall photographed the room.

It's great how small changes can make such a big impact!

Nice job Stephanie. Love the color. Warm and inviting.

Stagers, I have questions based on this picture.  Obviously this after photo looks much better than the before photo.  If I had to choose, I'd pick the after photo as all of you would too.  Here are my questions:   Would you other stagers have chosen red as your accent color for the shower curtain?  I would have done a very monochromatic shower curtain to make the space look bigger.  Red is a color that is bold and advances to the eye....so in this case it makes the room look smaller.  And what's on the floor that would need pillows in the bathroom?  That element is confusing to me.   If you are going to spend a clients money in this space, I would have traded the pillows for  a larger piece of art on the wall.  I would have done a neutral bath towel and an accent hand towel over it with a matching hand towel by the sink.  I was taught to use some very set design rules when staging in order to produce specific results.  What would you have done?

What good are rules if they can’t be broken?  My inventory has only neutral shower curtains, but if I am working with what the client already owns then I am more flexible. I believe it is mentioned in the original post that the staging provided a tie in with the guest room.  So it would be hard for me to say what I would have done without seeing the guest room and knowing the situation around who was providing the curtain and towels. I would guess from the wording that the client was purchasing them and perhaps wanted them to tie in with other bedding, etc. which would be going to the next house.

Staging is about solving the problem the best you can in a short time with what you have available.  The results might not be the ultimate design solution but if they give the prospective buyers a good feeling, then the staging has done its job.  This bathroom might not look as large as it possibly could but it does look up to date and inviting.

I questioned the cushions too.  Apparently they were sitting on a bench and the picture was taken by the homeowner who had added back some extraneous things.

Lisa, I appreciate your response and wanted to use this opportunity to address your questions.  The background on this home may help make more sense out of the choices for this space.  The home is located in Ft. Worth, Texas in a premiere community.  It was a 6,000 sq. ft home and was listed for $800,000, which is quite hefty for this region.  The potential buyer at the time would have had high expectations for this home.  It had to have a very sophistcated appeal.  For most jobs, I too would have gone with a more neutral/subdued option.  However, in this case, the bathroom was adjoined to the guest room, which was already tastfully decorated.  Very crisp, clean, simple, neutral walls yet had very elegant custom bedding (that coordinated with the NEW bathroom decor.)  In the bedroom, the poppy color, though bold, was simple enough to add elegance without distraction.  Now the adjoined bathroom (before), which was completely "disconnected" visually to the bedroom, was architectually just a plain jane space in an otherwise fabulous home.  Stumbling upon matching bathroom decor was a smart way to add cohesiveness to the two spaces (plus the homeowner wanted to take it with her to the new home).  You couldn't get around the fact that this was a small space.  So actually, the poppy color worked beautifully, adding a breath of life and made the space a lot more interesting.  We actually received a lot of compliments during the open house.  And as was mentioned, the pillows were on a sitting bench in a nook that the homeowner (for whatever her reason) moved into the photo when she took the shot.  Lesson learned here....always take your own after shots!   

I agree I usually go for the crisp clean spa like bath, but I think the red works,especially with the reasoning behind it.