How Joanna Gaines Hacks A Shower Curtain Into Making Your Bathroom Look Bigger

You don't want any room in your house to look too cramped — but it's especially important with a bathroom. Unfortunately, the odds are working against you when it comes to making a bathroom look bigger. Already tinier than other rooms, and generally jam packed with everything from towels to toilets, it's easy for a bathroom to feel claustrophobic.

Thankfully, though, designers like HGTV's Joanna Gaines know how to work a little home design magic to make even the smallest bathrooms look bigger. And don't worry — it's not a hack that requires knocking out any key fixtures (though Gaines does swear by certain bathroom renovation tips if you're in the mood for a total overhaul). On an episode of her hit reality TV show "Fixer Upper," she offered a quicker and more affordable hack to transform a small bathroom on a budget. To make a bathroom appear bigger, Gaines suggested picking a textured shower curtain in a light color. 

Gaines understands how important color and texture can be to create dimension in even the tiniest of rooms. Depending on the size of your bathroom, a shower curtain unfurled across your tub is probably going to take up a good chunk of the visual space in the room. If the material of the curtain is too dark and heavy, it may draw the eyes in, rather than keeping them dancing around the other visual elements of the space. This can have the effect of narrowing an already small room, making the walls feel even closer than they are. By comparison, a shower curtain in a lighter color — especially one in a bathroom that gets some natural light — can enhance any brightness in a room and make the space feel larger.

That doesn't mean there aren't ways to use dark colors to make your bathroom appear bigger, it just means that you have to use those deeper shades in a strategic way. For instance, perhaps you play around with texture. In the same "Fixer Upper" episode, Gaines noted that a textured shower curtain is another way to add visual intrigue that can allow the eye to travel and make the space seem bigger. For instance, maybe you find a billowy white shower curtain with colored trim ruffles, or a vibrant tufted pattern. This can be a way to incorporate depth and bold colors, while still keeping the overall space light, breezy, and bigger than it really is.