With retro seemingly taking over every room of the home, there's now an era for every occasion: while the Mad Men look of the '60s is making a comeback in living rooms and kitchens, '20s-era opulence is making a Great Gatsby-inspired resurgence in dining rooms and bedrooms. And if you're a trendy east London pub? Well, everything in between, the more battered the better.
But for bathrooms, the key look is that of the '40s and '50s, according to one design expert. Considered creams and whites dominate the colour palette, while tinged throughout is gold and bronze on accessories and furniture.
That's according to Alexi Sugden, interior designer and art director at Egerton Designs. According to Alexi, the trend for 'softer' bathroom areas is typified by the luxurious retreats of the '40s and '50s.
"Bathrooms are being softened," she says. "The bathroom is seeing a new look in the return of 1940s and 1950s old fashioned tubs and curved and modelled basins. Taps are bronze and gold - like they were back in the 1950s.
"The plentiful use of real marble surfaces in white and grey - as indeed was used at the period - completes the look.
However, shower cubicles will never go away - thank goodness - and even they have bronze or gold controls."
Such a look complements strong, feature lighting, and bathroom wall lights in particular suit the look. Try the Endon 499-GO Sphere Gold wall light, a golden fixture with an elegant pull-switch, the ornate fitting will be right at home in a '40s bathroom, but meets all 2012 standard lighting requirements for operating in a water-filled bathroom.
And interior designer Adrienne Chinn of adriennechinn.co.uk agrees that ornate fixtures in an array of colours are making a splash in bathrooms. "We're moving away from the white, chrome, and beige bathrooms to pattern and colour," she said.
