Framing Bathroom Mirrors

We had the best time on our Valentine's weekend getaway! It started with the fabulous Bon Jovi and included dinner and movies and snow flurries (a must in State College) and just hanging out with my favorite guy in my favorite place. But we also managed to fit in a project that has long been on my to do list.



The bathrooms in our townhouse all came with those big (gigantic), not so pretty (pretty awful), unframed mirrors.




I know there are companies that sell mirror frames pre-cut to your specifications in a wide variety of styles. But I knew we could do the job for much less and have the satisfaction of having done it ourselves.

So we headed off to find some pretty molding. I really love molding and would have gone for more detail, but we had two things to keep in mind for our particular situation. First of all, the mirrors in all three bathrooms are so big that they go up under the lights at the top so there's not much space for a thick decorative molding.

And at the bottom, they come all the way down to rest on the backsplash, so again, we really couldn't go too thick.

We found some lightweight FRD tileboard moulding (cellular vinyl) that fit the bill perfectly. It was even preprimed. The little description said that it "accepts paint and stain, cuts easily, won't crack or split and is superior to wood and MDF" - perfect!

You'll need a miter box to cut the molding. These things always confuse me. Just take a minute and think it through carefully before you cut.

We used Liquid Nails Mirror Adhesive to attach the molding directly to the mirrors.

Kevin suggested we do a little test to figure out just how much adhesive to use. We used a scrap piece of molding, applied some adhesive and pressed it down on a sheet of newspaper. Then we flipped it back over.

We wanted to be sure we had plenty of good contact, but it was important that we didn't have adhesive oozing out on the mirror because that just wouldn't be pretty.

Then I gave all the molding two coats of paint, front and back. There will be an ever so slight reflection of the back of the molding in your mirror, so just go ahead and paint both sides.

I used the same white paint (Sherwin Williams Pure White) that's on all the trim in the house. You could also stain the trim to match your cabinets, but I have a bit of a cottage look going throughout the house, so the white was perfect. I loved that big bucket of paint! And there's a reason I normally paint outside. I had speckles of paint all over the kitchen!

When we measured, we allowed for the molding to overlap the edge of the mirrors ever so slightly. And then we started by adhering the bottom piece first.

The next three pieces went up all at once. We stood on stools and each of us took a top corner. We each lightly adhered our corner along with a side piece, then I held both top corners in place while Kevin hopped down and set the bottom corners just right. Thanks to some careful measuring and cutting (thanks dear!) all the pieces fit perfectly. It would have been easier with a third person to set the bottom corners and a fourth person to take pictures, but we made it work with just the two of us, no problem



Here you can see how the molding fits up under the lights ...

and rests nicely on the backsplash. And with the slight overlap we allowed, you can't even see the edge of the mirror.

I put a just a bit of caulk (notice the pink) in the corners for a smooth finish. Just apply and smooth out the caulk with a finger and paint when dry.




Since none of our bathrooms have windows, it was a little hard to get a good picture. But here's the downstairs powder room.

The finished upstairs guest bathroom.

And the finished master bathroom. ... Big difference, don't you think?

I am absolutely thrilled with the results! I think this is one of those simple projects that can have a huge impact on the look of a room. If you have one of these big, unframed mirrors in your bathroom, frame it out. You won't believe the difference it makes!

And this project is super economical too. We bought 6 strips of molding at $5.57 each, 2 cans of liquid nails at $4.97 each and 1 tube of caulk (the one thing we forgot to take with us) at $3.77. Our total was $49.48 with tax. That comes out to just $16.50 per mirror!!! Talk about getting a big bang for your buck!

Thanks to my sweet husband for indulging me with yet another project, especially on our getaway weekend! We are most definitely a good team!

***Be sure to read the follow-up post here!

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