The Cumbernauld Small Bathroom
Small bathrooms are the signature Cumbernauld job. The original New Town housing — CDC-era flats and deck-access blocks across Kildrum, Seafar, Carbrain, Abronhill and Condorrat — was built around a compact bathroom footprint of roughly 1.9 m × 1.7 m, smaller than almost any older-stock equivalent you'll find in Falkirk or Glasgow. The soil stack typically sits on the outer wall, the window is small, and the prefab wall panelling that came with the original 1960s fit-out is usually still in place 60 years later.
The challenge is fitting a functional bathroom — walk-in shower, vanity and WC — into 3.2 square metres and making it feel generous rather than cramped. That's a design problem, not a materials one, and it's what the free home visit solves.
Wet-wall panels save 10–15 mm off every wall against a tile-and-adhesive finish. In a 1.9 m × 1.7 m Kildrum or Abronhill flat that's 4–5 cm recovered — enough to swap a cramped 800 mm corner shower for a 900 mm frameless walk-in.
A wall-hung WC with concealed cistern and a shallow-projection vanity clear the floor visually and give back 15 cm of useful standing room. In a CDC flat bathroom with a concrete wall behind, the concealed cistern sits in a purpose-built stud frame.
A hinged shower door needs 70 cm of swing space. A sliding or pivot door doesn't. In a tight Carbrain or Greenfaulds bathroom that's the difference between usable and permanent obstacle.
