Honestly, I'd go with tile or vinyl. Yes, vinyl. lol My style is country and I have a vintage patterned vinyl in there.

We have ceramic tile in the kitchen & utility room, which IMO are just like bathrooms, both can get water leaks.

Just last week I found a puddle of water under the washing machine, it had a very slow leak. Imagine if it was sitting on wood?

I wouldn't risk it.

I'd do hardwood and put a mat in front of it. I don't think you'll get water on the floor except for where you stand.

How about wood look tiles?

http://www.trendyfloors.com/index.php?cPath=23_40

My family consists of sloppy showerers so as much as I'd love a wood floor in my bathroom, they'd just ruin it.

This bathroom is just for us. The existing shower stall is very large and has a rack with towels on it and some hooks, so we just dry off before we even leave the shower, even now. I am the only one who would used the tub.

My choices at this point is do I put my tub right on the wood floor, or on a platform or imbedded "rug" of tile or marble.

Yayagal.. I'm having one of my slap myself in the forehead moments. Your post made so much sense. Boats are made out of wood and they're not getting damaged by water.

I just looked up Spar varnish and it's supposedly softer than a varnish you'd use in the house. It's softer so it expands to cover the wood when its hot or humid. It sounds like it would be perfect for a bathroom floor.
There are many different brands too.

Come to think of it. A friend who owns a restaurant told me he covered his handmade wooden bar with spar varnish, and it's held up beautifully.

wow. I want to redo my kitchen and bathroom floor now. Poor hubby.

This house has old wood floors in two bathrooms and in the kitchen. They apparently have been varnished, and we have had no problems with them.

The bigger problem is the toilet area. Urine degrades even polyurethane and I don't know of a single male that has as good of an aim as he thinks he does---or wipes up errant drops behind himself. I don't think a bath mat would do it 100% for protection either. Sure, it would protect the most vulnerable area, the front and along side the toilet, but have you cleaned the back walls and floor behind the toilet? In the old bathroom of my college days, the wood baseboard behind the toilet was a smelly gross mess and there weren't that many males visiting!

Holly,

The toilet is actually in a water closet, and given the layout, we plan to tile that room in the same tile as the shower. But you make a good point!

I suppose this is not a typical wood-in-the-bath question, because it actually excludes the toilet and shower areas. The tub is more prop then everyday use, if I am honest about it. I really like the look of a tub on a wood floor.

I don't see any reason you couldn't put wood under your slipper tub, with a cotton bath mat used when you exit the tub. Most people dry themselves with a towel before even stepping out of the tub, anyway, so there's even less chance of the floor getting wet. If you are the only one using it, you'll take care of it as you should. Sounds lovely, IMHO. I've got wood in our powder room, even under the toilet, and have never had a problem.

I have had cherry wood floors in my last 2 baths and I love it. We are careful about water on the floor, use bathmats. It is so warm under your feet and forgiving if you drop you glass bottle foundation...

Woodstone Oak Porcelain Tile from Floor and Decor Outlets. $2.19 per square foot. Cheaper than wood, more durable than wood, more water resistant than wood, and can easily have electric underfloor cables installed under it.

Here is a link that might be useful: Woodstone

I have had wood floors in DH's bathroom for about 18 years and have had no problems. My floors are finished with 3 or 4 coats of poly. I know you said you did not want to use poly, but water is not going to penetrate polyurethane, nor does it turn the floors white. I have no experience with any other type of finish. I have a rug in front of the shower, plus he usually lays a towel down when stepping out. He is not all that careful either.

Have never had a problem around the toilet.

I am planning a total remodel in my personal bath in the near future and will be replacing worn out vinyl with wood. Yeah! My entire house will be wood except for the laundry.

I'm a fan of wood-look porcelain tile but be sure it is color-through porcelain. Otherwise, any scratch will show the color of the unglazed porcelain - basically white. On dark tile especially, that's really noticeable. OTOH, scratches are probably less likely in a bathroom than in other rooms of the house.

No experience with wood flooring in bathrooms, but I will offer the advice fom my flooring guy. We installed white oak in our kitchen 6 yrs ago. His recommendation at that time was to have the surfaced scratched ( forgot the flooring term ) every 1-2 yrs. and 1 coat poly applied. I just did this a few weeks ago on ours, this was 3 rd time since install.

The floor guy was quite pleased with how good the floor looks,basically new. According to him this is where most people fail, taking care of wood floors in high traffic areas and then end up needing a complete refinish. It's a minor hassle, I sched it when they family is away for 1-2 days. You have to move all freestanding items, furnishings out, sme odors and very small amt dust, on baseboards.

So the short of it is understand your surface maintenance needs. Good luck

we've had a couple of houses with wood in the powder room and lots of males peeing and splattering...not a problem at all, though they do have a poly coating.
marble on the other hand is a different story-marble(even sealed!) and urine don't seem to mix...

i would put wood in the master bathroom...

this is very timely, since we just discovered a toilet seal leak...we have hardwoods in the baths knowing the risk, however the toilet had never leaking in the years we have been here, so murphy's law rears it's head again...

that said, i would still use the hardwood as it just 'works' for our home, which is a smaller condo with layout issues and it helps tremendously with 'flow'

what we did do however was use a piece of hardward as a door unraised 'threshold' ..we did this in the case of a flooring water related disaster so that we could cleanly remove and replace the flooring with either more hardwood or tile should we change our minds....we purchased quite a bit of extra hardwood because we did the entire level (kitchen included) and we wanted to make sure we could have replacement boards if needed...the leak hasn't done any major damage, we have turned the water off to the toilet and will be reseating it...i may get by without any noticeable damage, we're going to wait about a week to see how the wood responds to being wet...

good luck!

We redid all the BA when we bought our home. I too dreamed of a wood floor with a tub. Carlisle, who provided the random width wide plank pine, said it was no problem in a bathroom (it also has radiant heat flooring, btw). It has just tung oil, and the cleaning people use water with vinegar on it, just like they do everywhere else.

It's been less than a year. I love it. This bathroom is mine only, DH has his own, so I can baby it. But I'm not sure if I need to.

I think ive posted shots of the tub but not one that shows the floor. I will try to to do, but I can't find my camera cable...

In short, go ahead, I'd say!

I refinished the doug fir floor in my main bathroom with Waterlox (an oil-based varnish), and we've been using a clawfoot tub with shower on it daily for the past 4 years - nary a problem. Love it, wouldn't want anything else underfoot.

In terms of water damage, what people often don't mention is that any flood big enough to damage solid hardwood floors would also damage a tile subfloor. Grout is not a waterproofer, it's permeable.

Wood, wood, wood. Love it.

Kitschy - I have a photo that shows the floor and tub. The first photo is a little washed out because of the sun and because, well, I'm not much of a photographer. Here ya' go.

{{!gwi}}
{{!gwi}}

Your set up is similar to mine, the shower and toilet are in a smaller room off of the area with the tub. I do use the tub but not a ton and I am careful about not getting water all over the place.

{{!gwi}}

Thank so much everyone. I am sorry I don't always get around to logging on right away. This is very helpful. I can prove to everyone know that it IS done. And looks just as pretty as I was thinking.

Athomeinva - your bathroom is lovely. I like the shutters, I might have to steal that idea.

Mtnredx - Oh, my, so nice! Is that your .. dog? Where is your bath mat from?

Yes, that's our Golden Retriever puppy. The bath mat is actually a silk rug I bought in Istanbul on a business trip a few years back. I also bought a similar one that is 5x8 we have in our Living room. They are very delicate and recommended as wall hangings (c'est la vie). This little one isn't really in the traffic flow where it is, and when I take a bath i pick it up and put down a terry mat. At least I get to enjoy it every day!