Bathroom Ceiling Height
It wasn’t long ago that the standard ceiling height for a house in America was eight feet. This was the height of standard wood studs and gypsum board (also known as drywall or sheetrock) came in four foot wide sheets, so abiding by the standard height meant less material waste when building. (By the way, drywall is installed sideways on the studs with the four foot dimension being vertical and the eight or twelve foot dimension running horizontally). But times have changed and the trend is toward higher ceilings. It’s rare to find even a mid-priced new house with ceilings less than nine feet high. And most high-end houses have ten foot or higher ceilings.
But, there are places in Your Perfect House where a nine or ten foot ceiling might be too high. Small rooms, such as bathrooms might feel uncomfortable with a high ceiling. A ten foot high ceiling in a five foot by six foot powder room can make the space feel like an empty elevator shaft. Your dining room is a room I call a “sit down” room. When you are seated at a table, high ceilings can be just as uncomfortable as a ceiling that is too low. Frank Lloyd Wright used low ceilings to great effect, often enhancing the drama of nearby higher through the contrast of heights from space to space. He used lower ceilings to create a sense of intimacy.
Obviously, the ceiling of one floor is the floor of the next one above, so it’s impractical to have the second floor step up and down just to create varied height ceilings on the first floor below. But there is nothing stopping you from framing down a lower ceiling in the spaces that can’t handle the height. Think about lowering the ceilings in bathrooms and powder rooms. Consider framing down the perimeter of your dining room to create a tray ceiling that defines the space where the table will sit. Tray ceilings can make a large bedroom feel more cozy.
And on a very practical note, think about framing down the shower ceilings to eight feet. This will make the shower warmer, since it will hold in the warm, moist air better while you are showering. It also will reduce the cost of tiling the walls all the way to the ceiling because there will be less wall to cover.
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Tags: Bathroom Design, ceiling height, high ceiling, house design, shower, shower tile, tray ceiling
October 13th, 2009 at 9:51 am
What are your views on whether to tile the shower/tub all the way to the ceiling or stopping (as I usually see) about 9-12″ below the ceiling? Thanks!
October 13th, 2009 at 11:00 am
Lola – I think it is best to take the tile to the ceiling. That top edge of the tile is a difficult spot to keep clean and the drywall above it can suffer from the exposure to water over time. If your ceiling is very high, you might want to frame down the ceiling in the shower area. This will reduce the amount of tile you’ll need and also keep the shower warmer when you use it.
December 2nd, 2009 at 1:33 pm
Curious what you might recommend for a tall (10 ft) loft bathroom to make the room feel a bit less huge and uncomfortable. Unfortunately, I can’t frame down the ceiling because of a building sprinkler system. Thanks!
December 2nd, 2009 at 8:22 pm
Steven – This is an interesting question, but a little off this topic. I’ll answer it here and also post it as a new post for others to read and comment upon.
I would suggest using an architectural trick from days gone by. Install a cornice (a piece of crown molding with a solid top, like a plate rail) at the height you would like the ceiling to be. That might be eight foot high if the bathroom is not large. If there is any crown molding where the wall meets the ten foot high ceiling, remove that. Then paint the wall color only up to the cornice. Paint the cornice the trim color. And paint the wall above the cornice and the ceiling all the ceiling color, presumably ceiling white. You will trick the eye into thinking the room stops at the cornice height and the room will feel better proportioned.
June 23rd, 2010 at 12:53 pm
I have found high and vaulted ceilings in rooms make my head actually hurt. Seems to strain my eyes/neck with just normal living. This is also true for me in retail stores/spaces. My eyes want to look up constantly in these voluminous spaces. Have you ever heard of this? Today’s construction has trended towards the high ceilings, but it is really wasted space. We are currently lowering a 2 story family room ceiling to a lower vault. Would prefer to go to an 8ft ceiling but this would hurt potential resale. Due to the ceilings heights currently we rarely use this family room opting for an upstairs 9ft “bonus” room (2nd flr over garage space) as our family room space. Tough to accept given this is a new (2yr) home for us. I like your suggestion above regarding lowering ceiling height using something like plate rail. I will consider this in other rooms thru-out this house.
November 23rd, 2011 at 12:16 am
Our upstairs bath has no window and we decided to put in a skylight. Unfortunately, the bathroom is located in the middle of the house and with the skylight on the back facing roof slope, it also ends up right over our shower. We wanted to have a lower shower ceiling for warmth, so we framed a shelf type ceiling over the shower with the ceiling above it sloped up to the rafters/skylight. But now the skylight looks very far away and you have to strain the see it over the shower. We wanted the lower ceiling over the shower for warmth, but now wonder if we should just allow the whole ceiling to go up to the rafters? We have only framed and done some sheet rock and have stopped to rethink. Do you have any suggestions? The room is approx 10×8.
November 24th, 2011 at 10:48 am
Kathleen – A trick I’ve used for situations where the skylight is very far up but the ceiling should be lower is to put a window in the ceiling. This may sound unusual, but it is actually an architectural trick from long ago. Think about putting a tempered or safety glass window flat in the lowered ceiling of the shower. This will hold the heat down near the shower while giving the impression of the skylight being “right there” at the ceiling level. But you’ll still be able to get all of the light and visual effect of the skylight that’s at the roof. DO NOT USE REGULAR GLASS. This must be safety glass or tempered glass.
December 20th, 2011 at 11:25 am
I just tore out our 5′ x 5′ walk-in shower to redo it. It had a 32″ swinging glass door cut into the center of the wall between the shower and the rest of the bathroom. The header was 9′ and the ceiling height in the shower and the bathroom is 11′. I completely removed the wall with the glass door so now I have a 5′ opening into the shower that goes all the way up to the 11′ ceiling. With the wall and the door, the shower seemed more enclosed despite the high ceiling but I’d rather not put the wall back the way it was. I was thinking about putting a header in at 8′ and dropping the ceiling in the shower to 9′ or just putting in a header at 9′ and dropping the ceiling to 9′ and tiling up to the ceiling. What do you think? I’m 6’4″ so I’d rather not do an 8′ ceiling in the shower.
December 20th, 2011 at 4:23 pm
Troy – I think the 9′ ceiling sounds fine. If you put the header in at 8′, the shower will probably feel warmer since it will tend to hold in some of the warm, steamy air. If you put the header at 9′, the same height as the shower ceiling, the shower will feel cooler since the warm air can rise and escape more easily. This could be an advantage in humid climates since it will help let the shower dry out and reduce the potential growth of mildew in the corners of the ceiling. But it might be a disadvantage if you live in a cold climate and the warm shower is a retreat from the winter chill.
December 26th, 2011 at 2:25 pm
We’re building a new house – our master bathroom ceiling is designed at 7’6″ which feels like it’s pretty low. However, our architect wants to emphasize some view windows and to offset the master bedroom which has much higher ceilings (10′) and create a more intimate space. I understand the design philosophy but do you think 7’6″ is too low?