Waterproof Bathroom Flooring Ideas

If it’s one thing that your bathroom will abound in (unless you managed to mess up your pipe installations) – it’s water.

Whether it’s for running your washing machine, flushing the toilet, or having a bath after a hard day’s work, the bathroom is a place where water is the life force used for literally everything. Not only that, but it also comes in different forms, as well!

For example, for washing your clothes, the washing machine will suck in a certain quantity of water in its liquid form. While having a bath, on the other hand, a fair amount of this precious liquid will turn into steam and spread everywhere!

For this reason, it’s imperative that your bathroom’s construction is durable enough to withstand years of constant exposure to water in its various states and stages of evaporation, so speak. Indeed, nowhere is this more evident than in bathroom flooring.

A bathroom floor that is not sufficiently resistant to moisture will quickly start getting distorted and otherwise damaged. This can give you quite a headache and take substantial amounts of money from your pocket for repairs or even complete zugzwang overhauls.

In this article, we’ll talk about bathroom flooring options. In particular, we’ll be talking about waterproof bathroom flooring materials, so you can have a better insight into what sort of arrangement you can go for in your bathroom.

Right then, folks, without further ado, here’s the lot.

Waterproof Bathroom Flooring Options

Waterproof Ceramic & Porcelain Tile

Representing one of the most well-known and beloved options for bathroom floors, ceramic and porcelain tiles have been used for this purpose for millennia.

And for a good reason, too!

Other than possessing attractive appearances and a smooth surface that is a pleasure to walk on, tiles also offer excellent protection against water. This property is integral for these materials, as you won’t need anything else (a special coating to make them watertight) to make them completely impervious to water and steam.

The thing is, both ceramics and porcelain have a natural glaze top layer, which doesn’t allow a single drop of water or some other liquid to penetrate the layers beneath. All you need to do is simply install the tiles, secure them tightly in place with an adhesive, and then that’s it. (No additional coatings needed!)

Another attractive feature of these two materials is that they’re incredibly easy to clean. This is also thanks to their property to withstand exposure to water and other liquids. To clean a tile floor made out of ceramics or porcelain, use a sponge and a mop to swipe away the mess in question, leave the area to dry off, and Bob’s your uncle!

Waterproof Vinyl

If you’re on a lookout for an affordable flooring solution that, despite its low price, still looks amazing AND is completely watertight, look no further than the material called – waterproof vinyl. There’s another name that’s routinely used to describe this material, which is wood plastic composite. Or WPC, if it’s shortened.

This name pretty much describes what this material is made up of. It’s a composite crossover between wood and plastic. The wood in this combination gives this vinyl material its looks and that warm, pleasurable feeling beneath your feet as you walk over it.

The plastic, on the other hand, plays an important role in keeping it watertight and increasing its durability manifold!

Another great property of waterproof vinyl is that the options for its appearance are never-ending. Indeed, you can make this thing look like engineered wood, carefully arranged stone, or even porcelain and ceramics. Since the patterns are printed on the upper layer of this material, there are really no obstacles to making it look whichever way you desire.

Waterproof Carpet

Talk about an oxymoron, right!

It may seem completely counterintuitive, but you read that right – there is such a thing as a watertight carpet. Possessing the appearance of your everyday carpet, these specialized breeds of soft flooring can be made to be completely and utterly impervious to water and steam.

With the help of some special technological advances, which enable the manufacturers to protect the sensitive carpet fibers, these carpets will look like normal carpets you see in your living room, but will be able to survive prolonged exposure to water with ease!

Perhaps the most interesting aspect of the technology behind this curious carpet solution would be the fact that these carpet fibers do not only repel water but are also capable of wicking it out of the way if needed.

What this means effectively is that you can spill water, wine, beer, you name it, on your carpet, but its fibers will always make the liquid go towards the surface where you can pick it up and clean it off fairly easily. Quite impressive, isn’t it?

Waterproof Rubber

Possibly the best waterproofing solution on this list, if your main concern when it comes to bathroom flooring is the waterproofness element, would be rubber.

Naturally resistant to water and fairly easy to install in your bathroom, rubber is becoming more and more popular with folks across the user spectrum, so to speak. Whether it’s factories, gyms, swimming pools, or just ordinary people, an increasing number of sales are made in this department of rubber-based flooring.

Not so long ago, about the only customers of these rubber floors were swimming pool facilities, where having a waterproof floor is of utmost importance. Nowadays, however, people appreciate not only the rubber’s effectiveness against moisture but also the extent to which you can customize its looks, as well as its affordability when compared with other materials.

How to Waterproof Your Floor

In case you aren’t really interested in buying a completely new floor, but would still like to make the existing one that you have waterproof, you can have a big sigh of relief as this is quite doable, indeed!

In this section of our article, we’ll tell you how you can do this in 5 easy steps. Here’s the deal.

• Clean the Floor – … so you can have an easier time applying the waterproof layers. Dirty floors are, as a rule, the surest way you can make your bathroom overhauling task a futile and difficult one. Therefore, to ensure everything goes smoothly, and the layer of waterproof coating sticks, clean up the floor before starting.
• Apply the Primer Carefully – Primers are used as an undercoat for painting and waterproofing tasks. They make the main layer stick better and provide an additional level of protection against various forms of damage.
• Fill the Gaps with Silicone – Once you’ve cleared everything out from the floor, it’s important to close off any remaining gaps, so that what you’ve left with is a flat surface you can work with. (apply the necessary layers)
• Stick Masking Tape on the Walls – … unless you want the waterproofing agent all over your walls! Generally speaking, the lower part of your wall will be the most exposed to different smears and pieces of dust and other pollutants, so keeping it clean is of utmost importance.
• Start Applying the Waterproofing Agent – Once everything is ready to go, and all those cracks have been well-sealed off and protected, you can start working on the main layer. Start applying the waterproofing agent slowly, so that you can correct any missteps along the way. As you become well-versed, you can pick up the speed and finish off the job in no time! (Just make sure not to rush too much, of course.)

Final Verdict

In conclusion, making your bathroom floor waterproof is an important step toward increasing the longevity and general appeal of your entire bathroom. The rule for this delicate procedure is rather simple – the better materials you choose and the more diligently you approach this task, the better results you can expect in the end!