by I did a lot of labor over the Labor Day weekend. With floor and bench in place I needed to finish prepping the walls and install the trim around the windows, so that the tile work could commence. I started by putting corner angle at the entrance of the shower. That should have been done by the drywall crew. John, floor installer, pointed out to me what was needed. Fortunately I had strips leftover in the basement.
Not sure if it was needed, but I decided to apply a strip of the Kerdi material on top of it. I also applied a large swatch of it above and on the side of the window that will be inside the shower (see feature image). To waterproof the cement board on the 1st floor, I used RedGard and I had about 1/3 of the container left, so after applying mesh tape and thin set to the seams, I applied two coats of the product. With the shower walls protected I turned my sites on the window trim.
The goal was to replicate the original trim, but with the left window being located inside the shower I knew I couldn’t use the original trim. I turned to a product called Azek. It’s plastic and was available in 1×4 and 1×6, but they also made the decorative edge moulding that was a close match to the original. The left side of the large window is a piece of quartz, so I only had to trim out the other areas.
The shower window was a piece of cake; two pieces of 1×4 capped with the trim and cut at a 45 degree angle at the corner. The window seal is also a piece of quartz.
The other two windows were the challenge. The smaller windows in the bathroom are frameless, unlike in the bedroom. That made them larger and the method of install was different. There was a 5 1/2″ gap between the large and small windows. The 1×6 was perfect for covering it, but the top of the large window in the original trim was 1×4. That meant I could not do a simple 45 degree cut. I wasn’t sure how to do it, but noodled around until I figured it out.
Two cuts took three hours. 1×4 is really only 3.5″ wide and to get the correct angle I needed 3.75″. I didn’t have another 1×6 nor time to run to Lowes to buy another piece before the shop closed, so I returned home and grabbed the piece I had already marked up for the window seal. It was a 1×6 I had ripped down to 4″, the same width as the piece of quartz. The angle for the 1×6 I was able to cut on the miter saw, but the other I got to cut on the band saw, the first time I used it. With the cuts complete I returned home for the install.
The window seal had to be set first. I will NEVER pay a person to create window seals for me again. This is the only one I did and it was the most complicated due to two different depths of the two windows. It’s darn near perfect. Smooth sailing from this point forward. Two coats of paint and I now consider myself a finish carpenter.
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