So you saw the pretty side of our master bath renovation that went on last summer here. If you’ve ever had to renovate any room in your home, you know the story doesn’t end there.

Living with our bathroom the way you see it here was, for us, never really a huge issue. All we did was close the door when company came over - we had a guest bathroom. Once we took the decision to call a contractor, there was no turning back.

It began with several trips to specialty shops to amass as many samples as we could. With my history of surfing the web for interiors, I had seen so many inspirational photos and had a pretty strong hold on the vision for its final look.

We hired a contractor on a recommendation. There were delays, but once he actually began the work, things took off very quickly. I was impressed. Walls were taken down, new plumbing was being installed, tiles were laid, and then something happened, we ran out of marble for the shower and the faucet we had chosen for the bath was too short.

At this point, all the work came to a halt. The contractor decided to put in the order for the new tile himself and told us we had a minimum of three to four weeks to wait for it to be shipped seeing as it was on back order and the timing of the order also coincided with the construction holidays. We had no other shower or bath in our house so every night, we drove to my Father’s house to get clean. We had hoped to have been able to use our brand new shower at that point already.

Once he did come back, the finishing touches needed were, of course, rushed. The tiling for the ledge at the end of the tub was uneven and a one inch hole had been entirely filled with grout. I remember coming home that evening excited to hear he had been, only to find these disappointing issues. We called, we complained and because we had already paid him in full, there was no reason for him to come back and rectify his mistakes. We found out soon after that due to some unrelated permit issues, he no longer worked as a contractor so pursuing him, at that point, was no longer even worth our consideration.

I must say that after our experience, we are still so very happy with our new bathroom. It’s a true haven in our home.

I wanted to share this story with you though to explain to you how much I can appreciate interior designers who have to deal with so many of these unforeseen problems on a daily basis. With the tribulations we had during this whole process, it opened my eyes to how much planning, organizing and predicting it takes to truly complete a room to perfection. Sure, they’re daily routines involves choosing gorgeous fabrics and furniture but in the end, they make a very difficult job look easy and that is why they are the pros.