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Saturday, March 15, 2008

Do It Yourself Bathroom Vanities

Many people love nothing more than to roll up their sleeves on the weekends and tackle their home improvement projects. A popular room to redo is the bathroom, and with the right know-how, you can do a bathroom vanity installation yourself. One of the most inexpensive ways to add style and storage to your bathroom is to add a new vanity set. There are, however, a couple things to keep in mind before tackling your new vanity project, including material durability and installation ease.

Now, you don't want to go to all this trouble to install a cheap vanity that will need to be replaced in 2 years. This means you want to install a vanity made of durable, quality materials, so remember to choose a vanity cabinet wood or material that has been treated to withstand the humid conditions of a bathroom. Select a countertop that is water resistant or even waterproof, made of granite, marble, ceramic, wood or tempered glass. When choosing your vanity sink material, you can choose a vessel sink vanity or under-mounted variety, which can be porcelain, stone, stainless steel, copper, or other materials. When creating your unique bathroom vanity look, choose faucet fixtures that bring the design idea together, so that you have a planned, cohesive design.

Of course, installing your new vanity yourself will be the most cost effective way to redo your bathroom. If you need a little help with hooking up the plumbing correctly, don't be afraid to call a plumber to help with this part. If you are confident in your own do-it-yourself skills, just follow these simple steps to installing your new vanity. First of all, make sure to shut off the water and disconnect the water supply to the current sink and drain. Use a bucket to catch any water that drips from the supply lines under the bathroom sink and the p-trap, which is the white curved pipe in the center.

Once your water is turned off and safely disconnected, loosen the caulk between the bathroom vanity and the wall. You can do this with a simple utility knife. Make sure to not scratch up your wall paint, otherwise you'll have another project next weekend! Remove the sink countertop very carefully, watching that you don't take half the wall with it. You will usually need at least 2 people or more to take the old countertop and vanity down, so don't do this alone.

Using a cordless screwdriver, you can loosen the screws that attach the vanity to the wall. Remove the old screws and carefully dislodge the old vanity. Again, this is usually not a one-person show, so get an extra pair of hands to help you with this. Take the old vanity and take it to the furniture graveyard, or wherever else old vanities go to die! Now it's time to get ready for the new bathroom vanity. Find the wall studs, and make marks for new screw holes. Remember to make marks for the studs a little higher than where you want the new vanity top to sit.

Once the vanity is positioned, attach it to the wall using wallboard screws. Now that you have attached the cabinet, and before you attach the new bathroom countertop, install the new sink faucet. When installing your cabinets and countertop, make sure you check that they are level against the wall. Then use tub-and-tile caulk to attach the new countertop to the base. The final step is to reconnect the plumbing with Teflon tape, and to carefully apply a thin line of caulk around the sink countertop edges. Take a deep breath and enjoy that feeling of accomplishment: You are finished installing your very own new vanity!

If you would like more information on bathroom vanities or would like to look at different variations of vanities, please visit Premiere Vanities.

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