Bathroom Design Ideas: Buying Wenge Bathroom Furniture
Wenge (pronounced weng-gay) is a hot new trend in bathroom furniture. Luxuriously dark in colour with a beautiful natural grain, this tropical hardwood is also sometimes known as African Rosewood or Faux Ebony.
Wenge bathroom furniture is available in many styles and designs, all of which could bring a new opulence to your bathroom. If you’re a fan of freestanding, solid wood furniture, then try combining a solid wood wenge washstand with a couple of tall wenge cabinets for a classical, timeless look. There’s almost as much variety in wenge as in any other wood: both washstands and vanity units can start at around 450mm wide and less than 400mm deep, and they range upwards in size exponentially, meaning that if you have a large bathroom and a soft spot for a supersized basin, the sky’s the limit.
Pictured: Elegant Wenge Bathroom Vanity
It’s a similar story with freestanding cabinets, storage units, and other bathroom furniture pieces. Sizes are variable, and if you’ve measured up your bathroom and know what you want, the chances are you’ll be able to find it. And of course, there are a great variety of fitted bathroom furniture pieces available in wenge, if your preference is for a sleek, fitted style.
So, what’s the best way to go about choosing your new wenge bathroom furniture?
If you’re planning to put in new dark wood bathroom furniture where previously you had lighter toned items, or a traditional fitted ceramic bathroom suite, do make sure you’ve properly assessed the impact this will have on the appearance of the room. Wenge looks fantastic, but if your bathroom is small or dark you’ll need to limit the extent to which you use the wood, or it could overwhelm the space.
Look at how much space and natural light you have. If the room is small or appears dark already, you’d be well advised to limit your use of wenge a little and to emphasise the light in the rest of the room: keep your walls and ceiling white, for example, and add mirrors to reflect the light you have. If, however, your bathroom is large and flooded in daylight from morning until evening, you can have as much wenge bathroom furniture as your heart desires and the room will suffer no ill effects.
Think a little about cost. Wenge bathroom furniture can be crafted of solid, natural wood, or constructed from a composite material with a wenge veneer covering. Both will look beautiful: the solid wood pieces are perhaps a little more ‘high end’, but veneered pieces work extremely well in a contemporary bathroom. The cost will vary: solid wood is usually more expensive, while veneered items are generally manufactured, and therefore sold, more inexpensively.
Once you’ve decided on the wenge items you’d like, whether that’s a simple washstand and accessories combination, or a fully coordinated set incorporating vanity unit, cabinets, storage units, linen unit, tall cupboard, and fitted bath panels, think about size. Width and depth are standard considerations: you know how large you’d like your cupboards, basin, shower and bath to be, and you’re able to rank your preferences for the bathroom furniture and plan a layout that will fit in with the size and shape of your bathroom.
But many people forget about height. Height of bathroom furniture is a key factor when it comes to useability and comfort. The height of a washstand, for example, typically ranges between 700mm and 900mm. This is quite a variation. Always try to make sure you buy furniture that suits your height and the respective heights of the rest of your household. Aches and pains from stooping and accidents from over reaching to get a daily use item from a cabinet that’s too tall for its owner can be so easily avoided with a little forward planning.
Whatever you choose, choose it because it really appeals to you. Settling for second best may mean you’ll want to change your bathroom furniture again in no time: by picking a design you love, you could be saving money in the future!
Helen Davies is a senior content writer for Better Bathrooms, suppliers of a range of bathroom furniture including some beautiful wenge bathroom furniture.
