It isn’t just a half bathroom — it’s a place to show off your personality.

The powder room is the hummingbird of the home: a room so small you may wonder whether it’s a room at all. No matter how diminutive, though, it’s a space that can be used to create an outsize design statement.

We look at the powder room as a little jewel box, a little wow factor, and somewhere you can impress your guests. You can be bold, because it’s not a space where you have to worry about getting sick of something. Dark, saturated colors and large-scale patterns that might seem overwhelming in a living room or bedroom are often ideal for a powder room. 

Focus Your Efforts

While eye-catching and even provocative design elements are fair game in a powder room, it’s important to determine your overall vision at the outset, so you don’t end up with a mishmash of clashing styles. It’s best to start with a concept, as many designers do.

Dress the Walls

One popular way to bring life to a powder room is with wallpaper in a bold pattern.

“People think a small space shouldn’t be dark or have pattern all over, but those rules are completely subjective,”

So feel free to break them, like an interior designer did in a powder room . Where the walls are covered in Serengeti paper from Hygge & West, a striking pattern featuring gold cheetahs on a black background. For another powder room in the same house, the designer chose even more intense wallpaper with an undulating metallic stripe that makes the walls glitter. Distinctive ceramic tile, or even an unexpected grout color, can have a similarly theatrical effect.

Focus on the Floor

If you have a quieter wall finish in mind — paneling, paint, subway tile — consider making a statement with the floor.

For a recent project, where an architect, had designed handsome wall paneling and molding, she installed a floor of graphic black-and-white cement tile from Mosaic House to create a high-contrast surprise for anyone who steps inside.

Choose Your Sink or Vanity

The sink is the centerpiece of the powder room, and there are countless styles to choose from. For extremely space-constrained situations, or in rooms where you don’t want the sink to be the center of attention, a simple porcelain wall-mounted or pedestal sink may work best. For slightly larger rooms, many manufacturers offer complete vanity units, with a base, top and sink.

But if you want a unique, dazzling place to wash your hands, it’s hard to do better than a custom vanity top made from exotic stone a custom vanity top can be paired with a sink mounted underneath for a streamlined, integrated look, or with a vessel sink that sits on top, for a more sculptural appearance.

For support, the vanity top can be mounted directly to the wall, so that it almost appears to float. “When you float a vanity in a small space, it makes the room feel a little larger, compared to something that goes to the floor.

Consider Stone Remnants

Natural stone is usually sold in large, expensive slabs, but because so little is needed for a bathroom vanity, it’s possible to use remnants from stone suppliers, or reclaimed pieces from architectural salvage operations.

Add a Warm Glow

The powder room is where guests will check their hair and makeup, and you can enhance their experience by adding fixtures that provide flattering light. Avoid using bright fluorescent or bluish-white LED lights. Instead, aim for low levels of warm light with a color temperature of about 2,700 Kelvin.

Sconces or pendants hung near eye level on either side of the mirror will provide light where it’s needed, while an overhead fixture can deliver general illumination for the rest of the room.

And beyond functionality, think of light fixtures as an opportunity to add sculptural appeal to your bathroom.

Choose Accessories with Personality

Because powder rooms have so few objects in them, every accessory is an opportunity to introduce a little personal style.

The mirror, for instance, can be more than a standard reflective rectangle. Instead, you might hunt for a vintage mirror with an ornate frame or a contemporary mirror in an interesting shape.

If you’re tired of standard chrome faucets and towel bars, choose a less common finish, like copper, unlacquered brass or matte black.

Because in the end, a powder room isn’t just a bathroom, she said: It’s “a tiny, little sanctuary where you can really show your personality.”