walk-in showers

[Biloute]

Hello everyone !
Walk-in showers are called "douches Italiennes" in French... Is it because Italians are too lazy for lifting their legs enough to go into a tray ? No, I'm jocking: too much of French humor
When I was a builder, I always refused to install one for a customer because it was too risky about leaks, because the precautions would have lead to a huge estimate and because other brave builders had a very bad experience. Also, most of my customers wanted one upstairs on an old parquet floor with soil pipes too high.
Being retired and wanting to make one at least once in my life, I decided to have a go in our suited bedroom at the ground level.
I had to dig quite deep in all the rooms to have the soil pipes at the right level with a decent slope: lot of heavy work !
Then, I had to make a diamond shape screed with 3% slope down to a central high flow gutter. I waterproofed the floor and the walls with special membranes (Ditr/Kerdi) and sealed with polyurethan mastic where necessary.
I tiled the walls and the floor with matching tiles and mosaic. No need to mention that all the cements were waterproof !
Here we are :

[niemeyjt]

Have a look at Skillbuilder on YouTube also - they have done a whole series on these along with concealed cisterns etc

https://www.youtube.com/c/SkillBuilder

He uses Abacus Elements - for example see:

[Doug]

Not one to boast but I've fitted showers for 50 years and only had one give leaking problems.
But they were in houses which I designed back in the uk and ones which I completely renovated here.

[Spardo]

Very interesting, Biloute, and it appears you have done a really good job. 5 years ago we had to have our bathroom redesigned but the builder, who happened to be English, refused our desire for a walk-in as he wasn't confident of success. I should have took that as a warning, the list of things he did wrong, or didn't do at all, is as long as your arm.

I remember the emails between us from way back when and the fun we had with French and English as spoken by ourselves and our respective compatriots, so it amused me to see your use of 'suited'. Pronounced 'sooted' in English it means someone who is wearing a suit. I think you mean the past tense of 'en suite', which is a strange way of speaking in English, but hardly your fault because en suite (pronounced 'sweet') was stolen from the French and then misused by them/us. Of course in French it would be salle de bain attenant.

I look forward to more of the same, in French as well as English.

[Char]

Looks lovely - well done.

[DaveW]

I had a Portuguese builder renovate my place and had walk in showers installed. My daughter used him as well, he did a good job.


The pictures don't seem to work - it's all too complicated.

Edited by Char to add photos.

[Blaze]

Nice photos, Biloute and Dave

We are going to renovate our antiquated bathroom though we will have some professional help as we haven't the time or desire to do everything ourselves. We will have a flat shower tray instead of tiles and it will be mounted on a small plinth (the bathroom is upstairs) and "walk-in" at one end. Not a real douche italienne, but better than what we have at the moment as currently we have to step over not only the sides of the tray but also the frame of the sliding glass panels. There are some excellent local artisans here who come well recommended. The plumber came up with some interesting suggestions so it remains for us to choose what we want .... that's the hard part !
The waste pipe from the basins and shower is made of iron and has been embedded in the stone wall ion the hall. Rust is coming through so that will be sorted at the same time - again, not something we want to do ourselves.

[Char]

I've sorted it out for you [mention]DaveW[/mention]

Apologies to everyone else they're a bit big, but if you right click and open in a new tab you'll see them in all their glory.

They look really nice your plumber did a good job.

[DaveW]

I've sorted it out for you @DaveW

Apologies to everyone else they're a bit big, but if you right click and open in a new tab you'll see them in all their glory.

They look really nice your plumber did a good job.

The guy who did the waterproofing, tray and tiling was the real star, as are you.

[Char]

I've sorted it out for you @DaveW

Apologies to everyone else they're a bit big, but if you right click and open in a new tab you'll see them in all their glory.

They look really nice your plumber did a good job.

The guy who did the waterproofing, tray and tiling was the real star, as are you.

I'd assumed the plumber had done everything - who did you get to do all the rest then?