Talk about open concept…

I’ve had a couple of odd bathroom situations in my time.

I lived for a while in what was then one of the last residential buildings in what had been Boston’s West End. The West End was a vibrant Italian and Jewish immigrant enclave that was razed in the 1950’s and 1960’s to make way for redevelopment, largely given over to a now-outmoded and tired but then state-of-the-art apartment complex, and for the expansion of Mass General. When I lived there, there were still a couple of ancient Italian immigrants still in residence. Anyway, my apartment featured a tiny bathroom with a half-sized bathtub (and jerry-rigged show) and a toilet with an elevated tank and pull-chain flusher. But no sink. The sink was in the kitchen. So you used the bathroom and you washed your hands in the conveniently nearby kitchen sink.

In a more upscale but still oddball setting, I lived on the top two floors of a classic Beacon Hill townhouse. There were two bathrooms. The upstairs bathroom had a toilet and bathtub and was flanked on both sides by a tiny room with a sink. There was no shower in the bathtub because, given the configuration of the building, it wasn’t possible to stand up in the tub.

The bathroom with the shower was on the main floor, just off the living room. So that’s where we took our showers. Fine. But it was also just off the small galley kitchen. You could have walked around through the dining room and down the hall, but mostly to get to the living room from the kitchen, or the kitchen from the living room, we went through the bathroom. I tried not to think about the fact that there were plenty of times where I was carrying a plate of food or a glass of wine or a bowl of pretzels past the toilet. And mostly I succeeded. It was the way it was.

But I don’t think that I could think my way around a combo kitchen-bathroom. Which is the feature of a tiny (200 square foot) studio apartment, renting for $525 a month in St. Louis.

I’m all in on tiny living spaces, but this takes open concept a tad bit too far.

That said, I wiled away plenty of hours of my childhood fantasizing how I would convert our bathroom into a compleat home. The bed would fold down over the tub; the toilet would convert to a chair; the medicine cabinet would be swapped out for a bookcase. I can’t remember what I had worked out for my stove and fridge, but I loved thinking through having a compact little home of my own. 

I still like the tiny house idea, although I couldn’t do one of those ladder-to-the-loft ones. And I do think that 200 square feet might be a bit too tiny, even for me. Not to mention that if I were living that small, the bathroom could be plenty tiny but it would have to be separate with a door of its own.

No way I want to be able to stir the pot while on the pot. Or be soaking in that tub while the Toll House cookies are baking.

The article notes that the apartment has been rented by a man. I’m guessing young. I’m guessing single. I’m guessing doing a lot more Grub Hub than replicating what the Iron Chef just whipped up.

As I said, this takes open concept to a new, ewww level.