Riverside Master Bath

The Challenge

A Builder-Grade Bath on a Riverside Lot

Jennifer and Mark bought their Livingston home for the river. The Yellowstone flows less than a hundred yards from the back deck, and every window on the south side frames cottonwoods and rushing water. But the master bathroom — the room where they started and ended every day — could have been anywhere. It had the generic hallmarks of early-2000s builder spec: almond fiberglass tub-shower combo, laminate vanity, and a single overhead light that cast the entire room in the same flat, institutional glow.

The floor plan compounded the problem. At barely 130 square feet, the original bathroom crammed a narrow vanity, a linen closet, a toilet alcove, and the tub-shower into a layout that required choreography. Two people couldn't use it simultaneously without apology. There was no natural light beyond a single, small window that had been covered with a frosted privacy film, killing whatever connection to the river it might have offered.

"We'd go from sitting on the deck watching the sunset to walking into a room that felt like a budget hotel," Jennifer said. "It was the one space in the house that didn't feel like ours."

The original master bathroom with builder-grade finishes and cramped layout

The original bath — cramped, generic, and disconnected from the river setting

Our Approach

Borrowing Space, Bringing the Outside In

The breakthrough came from an adjacent walk-in closet. By reclaiming 50 square feet from a closet Jennifer described as "mostly ski gear we don't use in summer," we expanded the bathroom to 180 square feet — enough to fundamentally reimagine the layout. A new, smaller closet was carved from the bedroom hallway to compensate, keeping the overall storage roughly equivalent.

With the additional footage, we placed a freestanding soaking tub along the south wall, directly beneath a new floor-to-ceiling window that opens to the river view. The tub — a hand-finished composite stone piece in matte white — sits on a raised platform of honed slate tile, creating a visual destination that draws the eye the moment you enter the room. Behind the tub, the Yellowstone fills the window like a painting that changes with the seasons.

The walk-in rain shower occupies the former closet footprint, framed in frameless glass on two sides. A bench-height ledge in the same slate tile provides seating and storage. The rain head is ceiling-mounted, supplemented by a hand shower on a slide bar — because luxury isn't just how a space looks, it's how it accommodates the way real people actually use it. We opted for large-format porcelain on the shower walls in a soft, off-white that reads warm without competing with the natural materials.

The double vanity is custom-built in oiled walnut with undermount sinks and brushed bronze hardware that echoes the tub filler and towel bars. Radiant heated floors run beneath the tile throughout, connected to a programmable thermostat. In a Livingston winter, stepping out of the shower onto a warm floor isn't a luxury — it's a necessity that happens to feel extraordinary.

The Transformation

Before & After

Before After

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Craftsmanship

In the Details

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Freestanding soaking tub

Walk-in rain shower

Custom walnut double vanity

Heated slate tile flooring

Brushed bronze fixtures

River view through the new floor-to-ceiling window

River view through new window

"Every morning feels like a spa day. The heated floors, the rain shower, the view of the river — they thought of everything. I used to rush through getting ready. Now I linger. Mark has to remind me we have places to be."

J&M

Jennifer & Mark D.

Livingston, Montana

The Result

A Morning Ritual, Reimagined

Seven weeks from the first swing of the sledgehammer, Jennifer and Mark walked into a room that bore no resemblance to what had been there before. The cramped, generic bathroom was gone. In its place: 180 square feet of honed stone, warm walnut, frameless glass, and a view of the Yellowstone that makes you forget you're standing in a bathroom at all. The heated floor was the first thing Jennifer noticed at the reveal walkthrough — she kicked off her shoes and stood there for a full minute, laughing.

But the real test of any renovation isn't the reveal day. It's three months later, when the novelty has faded and the room has to perform under the pressure of real life. By every measure, this bathroom delivers. The rain shower runs every morning at 6 AM. The soaking tub sees use most evenings, often with a glass of wine and the window cracked to let in the sound of the river. The radiant floors haven't missed a morning all winter. The space doesn't just look like a retreat — it functions as one, every single day.

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