Before & After: Evicting a Cabinet Unlocked This L.A. Bathroom’s Wild Striped Shower Moment

PublishedAug 26, 2025 1:00 AM EDT

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When writer Connie Wang and her husband put an offer in on their Atwater Village home, they called it “practice.” As a dreamy Los Angeles enclave packed with charming bungalows on tree-lined streets, they figured this neighborhood was way out of their league—delusionally perfect fit aside. But then, in what Wang calls a “series of happy but unexpected events,” the house was actually theirs. For the next five years, they settled in and made changes at a glacial pace, skillfully ignoring the eyesore that was their main-floor bathroom.

“I hate waste, and big projects scare the pants off me, so for years I tried to gaslight myself into thinking the bathroom wasn’t that bad,” Wang says. “Maybe the rough brown tiles and gray grout were actually charming, even though you’d need a hazmat suit to clean them? And maybe the off-center frosted glass lighting was quirky, and not just ugly?” But if she was really honest with herself—and she eventually was—she hated almost everything about it.

One day, very pregnant with kid number two, Wang was on her hands and knees scrubbing grout when her last shred of patience evaporated. She was doom-scrolling Instagram as a coping mechanism and spotted that interior architect Courtney Madison—whom she’d met through a mutual friend—had posted a project photo. She knew Madison had a gorgeous home but had no idea she was available for hire. “I abandoned the grout cleaning immediately and texted her right away,” says Wang. Here’s how that text thread snowballed into a joyful, monochromatic bathroom renovation.

The home was built a century ago, but sometime in the mid-2000s, it underwent a renovation that Wang jokes is a “cautionary tale.” A towering bank of floor-to-ceiling cabinetry was crammed between the tub and the wall, so the only way to actually open any cabinet doors would be to perch on—or straddle—the toilet. The vanity provided slightly more storage, but toiletries still staged a daily jailbreak around the sink.

“The original bathroom had all the functionality of a paper umbrella, so we made it our mission to maximize every inch and create a space that actually works for their growing family,” says Madison.

Wang got in touch with the designer in February 2024, and by May, the hammers were swinging. Madison flipped the full-length cabinet from one side of the tub to the other—now the doors could actually open, novel concept—and sourced a larger vanity with enough drawers to satisfy a maximalist. There are hooks for towels, a shelf over the toilet, and more recessed storage complete with an outlet by the door (not pictured, but trust us). In other words, Wang wanted a workhorse bathroom in a tiny footprint, and Madison delivered the goods. “She fit in a laundry hamper and pull-out shelves so big we can store a Costco-sized TP fortress,” Wang says.

Madison knew that Wang wasn’t afraid of color, and they wanted to deploy it in a way that wouldn’t feel like a fever dream in a circa-1923 bungalow. They bounced ideas around, but Wang had a very specific image in mind. “I can’t hide from my overt theft here: I completely stole the tub tile design from Lucy Williams, whose London home has been relentlessly inspiring to me,” she says. “I often find myself leaving the shower curtain open just so the tub tile can be the room’s centerpiece.” The magic combo? Marazzi’s zellige tiles in the hues Bosco, Gesso, and Turchese.

Madison grounded the rest of the room in traditional touches like marble mosaic floor tiles and Shaker cabinets, giving those modern details permission to play nice. “I’m also pleased to report that the floor grout is 100-times easier to clean than the old tile that drove me straight into Courtney’s arms in the first place,” says Wang.

Wang and Madison aimed to choose a natural color that captured the family’s personality, and pistachio felt like the perfect pick (specifically, Behr’s Meditation Time paint color—yes, that’s really what it’s called). Initially, the plan was just to cover the paneling. But as the painters were working, they both decided: go big or go home. Well, go bigger in the home.

“I love color-drenching, especially in a warm tone like this—think cozy cashmere, but for your walls,” Madison says. The space felt better with less visual division, so they carried it all the way up to the ceiling like overachievers. “It’s a good reminder not to fight a room,” she continues. “If it’s dark, lean into cozy. No amount of white paint will magically make it feel bigger.” By the time the project wrapped in July, just before the birth of Wang’s baby, they’d both learned to use this bathroom’s limitations as superpowers.

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