Warm up your bathroom in style

Underfloor bathroom heating

This is no longer just for big houses or huge budgets. Underfloor bathroom heating will obviously involve a little more work than simply plumbing in a new radiator or towel rail. However, it can be a very worthwhile investment, particularly for a larger bathroom, or a bathroom with very high ceilings. By installing underfloor bathroom heating, your heating warms the entire floor surface, preventing the floor from being unpleasantly cold underfoot – common with tiled floors especially. 

Underfloor bathroom heating can use either water, or can be powered electrically. An underfloor heating system using water would usually be installed when the house is being built. Retro-fitting underfloor bathroom heating could potentially be fairly disruptive, however low profile systems have been developed which make the process easier. 

The easiest option of all is to use electric underfloor bathroom heating. This is usually much simpler to install; we would still recommend asking an electrician, however a confident DIYer could do it, with an electrician checking and signing off the work for safety purposes. 

Towel rail 

Towel rails have become one of the most versatile ways to heat a bathroom. From a single wall-mounted bar to ladder-style towel rails/radiators, the range of sizes, styles and heat sources is ever-growing.

One or even two towel rails can be sufficient to heat a very small bathroom or a small downstairs WC. There are electric models, which use your electricity supply to provide heat, and can be switched on or off at the flick of a switch. Others will use hot water and your central heating system to create the heat to warm up your bathroom.

Ladder style heated towel rails can range from very small – a couple of rails and possibly a heated shelf – to larger, multi-rail heated towel rails which can be wall mounted, or plumbed into the floor. Wall mounted rails allow more floor space, allowing for greater flexibility in placing bathroom furniture, or maximising space in a compact bathroom space. 

In modern bathrooms, the curved ladder style towel rail is becoming increasingly popular, as a cool complement to contemporary bathroom furniture. This can allow more space for towels to hang and warm up or dry, but may not be an ideal option if your bathroom is smaller. With space at a premium, the priority is the bathroom furniture, so a rail more flush to the bathroom wall will be preferable. 

Radiator

A traditional column radiator is one of the most common heating sources within a bathroom. It can usually be easily painted and repainted to match or complement existing bathroom furniture. 

Water pressure to radiators can sometimes be an issue, particularly within older houses and especially with upstairs bathrooms. Regularly bleeding radiators and checking the water pressure within your heating system should help to keep bathroom radiators toasty.