Bathroom Remodeling in Bath, ME
Kenneth Cox Construction remodels bathrooms in Bath, ME, with one eye on the room being rebuilt and the other on the original plaster ceiling directly below it.
- 38 years in business, since 1988
- Over 250 projects completed
- Affordable work, two-year written warranty
Most bathrooms in Bath sit upstairs in a house built long before indoor plumbing, so the pipes were threaded through framing that never planned for them. Move a fixture and you have to reach those pipes from somewhere: down through the bathroom floor, or up through the ceiling of the room below.
That room below often holds the original plaster, the moldings, sometimes a ceiling medallion. Once a boot goes through it, none of that comes back. Kenneth Cox Construction maps the access route before the first wall comes down, and usually works from above and eats the extra labor.
Ken has been working in Federal, Greek Revival and Victorian houses around the Kennebec since 1988, most of them older than the company by a century or more. Every finished bathroom carries a two-year written workmanship warranty from a BBB accredited company.
Why Bath Residents Hire Us for Their Bathroom Remodel
Kenneth Cox Construction has spent thirty-eight years working in houses that predate the company by well over a century. That teaches respect for what’s already there.
Our BBB accreditation is independently checkable. Every bathroom we finish carries a written two-year workmanship warranty.
Get a bathroom remodel estimate in Bath
Layout changes and tile work drive the price. Tell us which ones apply.
What other contractor services do we offer in Bath?
Where do we work besides Bath?
Where is our shop?
Directions from Bath, ME to our shop in Searsmont
128 New England RoadSearsmont, ME 04973
What Bathroom Remodeling Services Do We Offer in Bath?
- bathroom vanities, sinks, and fixtures
- walk-in showers and custom shower remodels
- tub-to-shower conversions
- tile work (floor, wall, shower surround)
- bathroom layout and design changes
- plumbing relocation
- accessibility and aging-in-place upgrades
What is our bathroom remodeling process in Bath, ME?
Get your free quote
Ken looks at the room below as carefully as the room above, then prices an approach that protects both.
We bring your project to life
Access is taken from above where it matters, dust is contained, and original material is kept and reused wherever it can be.
Enjoy your new space
You get a bathroom built for how the house is used now, and a ceiling downstairs that still looks like 1850.
Why choose us for bathroom remodeling in Bath, ME?
Most Bath bathrooms are on the second floor of houses built before indoor plumbing. The bathrooms came later, with pipes threaded through framing that was never designed to hold them.
Moving a fixture means reaching those pipes from one of two directions: down through the bathroom floor or up through the ceiling below.
If that ceiling has original plaster, moldings or a medallion, we almost always work from above and accept the extra labor. Restoring the plaster would cost far more.
It’s not close.
In a house this old, the ceiling below is often worth more than the bathroom above. Ornamental plaster and original moldings do not come back once a crew has put a foot through them.
Before demolition starts, Ken plans the access route. The finished work comes with a 2-year workmanship warranty from a BBB-accredited company.
We remodel bathrooms for owners of Federal, Greek Revival and Victorian houses in Bath’s historic district, as well as the mill-era homes behind it. Nearly all of them care about preserving what the house already has.
Owners of postwar houses at the edges of town call us too. The constraints are different, and the work usually moves faster.
Working from above means lifting the bathroom flooring, running the new drain and supply lines within the existing joist bays, and protecting the room downstairs throughout the job.
When possible, we number the old floorboards and return each one to its place. A patched floor beneath a new tile bed disappears.
A replaced ceiling downstairs doesn’t.
We work across Bath, from the dense historic streets near the waterfront through the mill-era neighborhoods and toward West Bath and Woolwich.
Downtown houses add tight access and shared driveways to the schedule. That matters more than people expect when a tub has to travel up a narrow original staircase.
Winter is the best time to schedule a Bath bathroom. The work is indoors and continues comfortably while the short exterior season is heavily booked.
A January booking can also make the necessary trades easier to schedule, shortening the overall timeline.
Plaster dictates the working method in these houses. It is brittle and original, and replacing it at any sensible cost is effectively impossible.
Then there’s the framing. Joist depths and spacing are irregular in houses this old, so a drain requiring a particular fall has to work with what is actually there.
The floors bring another problem. Nothing is level.
Getting a tile floor to read flat while making sure the shower drains properly takes shimming and patience, not a quick screed.
Ask the contractor how they plan to reach the plumbing, including whether they intend to open the ceiling below. That answer separates careful work from quick work.
Also ask what will happen to the original flooring. A board pried up and split may seem like a small loss, but those losses add up across the room.
A Bath bathroom requires more labor hours than a job gutted from below because working from above and protecting original finishes takes time. We show those hours plainly in our estimates.
We’d rather quote the careful method and lose the job to a cheaper bid than win it and leave you with a plaster repair you never agreed to.
What do people in Bath ask before starting?
Will historic district rules affect an interior bathroom?
Historic district rules rarely affect an interior bathroom, though anything visible from the street, such as a new vent or window, can be caught. We check with Bath Codes Enforcement and consult state preservation guidance when it applies.
Can you keep the original clawfoot tub?
We can often keep the original clawfoot tub, and refinishing one is usually cheaper than a good replacement. We will tell you when a tub is genuinely past saving.
Does the floor have to be leveled?
The floor has to be leveled for tile, mostly, and it is done with a bed rather than by jacking anything. The room stays as the house is, the floor surface just reads flat.
How do you keep dust out of the rest of the house?
We keep dust out of the rest of the house with containment at the door, floor protection on the route in and out, and cleaning at the end of each day rather than the end of the job.
Bathroom Vanities and Fixtures for Bath Homes
In Bath’s older houses, a vanity must fit the wall that exists, not the square one pictured in a catalog. We check plumb and usable clearance, then choose fixtures that can be serviced without damaging period trim.
Here, a carefully scribed vanity is a better investment than an oversized cabinet forced into a narrow room.
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What are your next steps for bathroom remodeling in Bath?
For bathroom remodeling in Bath, ask about method before materials. If your upstairs bathroom sits above original plaster, access to the pipes matters more than the fixture list.
Ken will walk through both rooms and price the careful version. Reach him at 207-386-9235.