Vanity Kills

Guys, I have the hardest time with bathroom vanities. When I started planning our renovation, it was seriously the bane of my existence. Obviously we aren’t made of money at this stage of life (what’s up student debt?) so we couldn’t afford to spend an obnoxious amount of money on a vanity, but the average cheap vanity just looks, well, CHEAP. Almost without fail it’s either white MDF or the worst middle ground faux wood veneer (you know that orangey medium tone that is trying to mimic oak but not quite getting there?) with a cheap, plasticy white counter top/sink. It inevitably comes with a cheap/ugly faucet that Seth will find perfectly functional and that I will not be allowed to swap out because that would be a waste of money. So I decided early on that I was absolutely not going that route for our new bathroom. Especially because the image of our new stand up shower in my head was screaming “expensive” (and you guys, it delivers. Wait til you see it) and an ugly vanity would have just ruined the ambiance.

Unfortunately, if you want a nice vanity that has a dark wood tone, or a vessel sink (the kind that sit on top of the counter), or a nice counter material, you are looking easily at spending $400 for one that is very plain and unadorned and if you want one with great details or lots of storage you are easily looking at close to $1000 or more. So I was in a pickle, because we had a big space to fill (meaning I needed a vanity that was on the larger side) but not a huge budget to work with. Hence, the idea of building our own vanity was born! I decided that if I could find a cabinet with lines that I liked, we could turn it into a vanity by adding a vessel sink and some plumbing. So I was on the hunt for a cabinet that would work, plus the perfect sink, and a great faucet.

I found the first cabinet at a store called At Home. I fell in love with this cabinet that I found online, but you can’t ORDER online. So off I went to find the cabinet of my dreams. The website claimed that this cabinet was in stock in both stores near my house, but when I got there, it was nowhere to be found, despite some very helpful store employees. I was crushed. But while I was at the second store, I stumbled upon this baby.

I liked the shape of the cutouts on the other cabinet a little better and the color of this new cabinet was atrocious, but the size and the lines were right, so I bit the bullet and bought it! I then spent a good hour sanding every surface of the cabinet lightly (so the paint I bought would adhere) and then cleaning it with tack cloth (to get all that dust off). Then I spent HOURS painting every nook and cranny of that cabinet “Milano Teal” by Glidden. We chose that color because it played off the muted teal color of the shower tiles but also brightened it up a bit. Once the paint had dried, we applied two layers of semigloss Polycrylic to the whole cabinet and three layers to the top to help waterproof everything and protect the paint from scratching.

During that whole process, I had also been on the hunt for a sink. This was tricky because our cabinet was long but narrow, so we needed a sink that was narrow enough to fit the depth of the cabinet. We ended up choosing this lovely white ceramic vessel sink for just a little over $100. At only 11.75 inches wide, it was narrow enough to fit our cabinet depth of only 14 inches, and I love that the shape is rectangular but there are no sharp corners for dirt and soap scum to get stuck in. Once we had drilled holes in the right places for the sink drain and the faucet, we attached this baby to the vanity top using clear silicone caulk, making sure to seal all the way around the edges of the sink so nothing yucky could get stuck in the crevice.

Last, we needed a faucet. I had already purchased oil rubbed bronze shower fixtures, so I knew what color I wanted. I also needed a tall faucet to accommodate how far the sink sticks up above the cabinet counter. Last, Seth and I have always been enamored with those faucets that look like an old fashioned hand pump, so I was hoping for something like that. This faucet from Home Depot fit the bill perfectly and wasn’t exactly cheap, but was much cheaper than other similar options.

So all in all, including paint and all of the fixtures, we spent about $600 on our vanity. Not as cheap as I would have liked, but you can cut that down significantly if you already have a cabinet you love the would work or can find one at a garage of estate sale on the cheap (hard to do in December/January when we started this project, unfortunately). Also, considering how expensive similarly sized and colored options are (like this one, that doesn’t come with a faucet, or this one, that doesn’t come with a faucet or a sink), I think we did really well on price point. Plus now we have a 100% custom vanity in our little bathroom. It fits the space perfectly and there’s not another one like it on earth. You can’t beat that for the money! 

What do you guys think? Would you make your own custom bathroom vanity? Or am I just crazy picky?