Star, Idaho
Fiberglass Unit to Tile Shower — Star, Idaho
A builder-grade one-piece fiberglass unit cut out and replaced with a tiled shower on a bonded membrane, with a niche, a corner seat and a frameless door.
- Idaho contractor registration RCE-57919
- $5,000,000 liability insurance
- 1 year workmanship warranty
- 26 customer reviews
Project data
- Location
- Star, Idaho (Ada County)
- Project type
- Full shower remodel
- Approximate wet area
- About 35 square feet
- Duration on site
- Roughly two and a half weeks
- Tile
- 12x24 greige porcelain walls, mosaic floor, accent niche
- Waterproofing
- Bonded sheet membrane over pre-sloped pan
Existing condition
A one-piece fiberglass shower from a mid-2000s subdivision build. The pan flexed, the surface had gone permanently dull from hard water, and the caulk line at the base had been redone enough times to leave a ridge.
What the homeowners wanted
Replace it with a tiled shower that looks intentional rather than builder-standard, keep the same footprint, and get storage that is not a plastic corner shelf.
Scope of work
- Cut out and remove the one-piece unit in sections
- Inspect framing and subfloor at the pan perimeter
- New mixing valve and trim
- Pre-sloped pan with bonded sheet membrane across pan, curb and walls
- Framed niche and a corner seat, both waterproofed as part of the same system
- 12x24 porcelain walls with mosaic floor
- Frameless glass door templated after tile
The problem we hit
A one-piece unit will not fit through a standard interior door, and the household had one other bathroom, so the room could not be out of service for long.
How it was solved
The unit was cut into sections and carried out, which is normal and is not extra demolition. We staged the work so the messiest phases happened back to back and the room was closed in before the tile phase, keeping the total out-of-service window inside what the household could plan around. Sequencing matters more than raw speed on a single-bathroom-down project.
Materials and systems
- Waterproofing
- Bonded sheet membrane with banded corners and curb wrap
- Pan
- Pre-sloped pan and bonded drain
- Wall tile
- 12x24 greige porcelain, offset layout
- Floor tile
- Porcelain mosaic for slope and slip resistance
- Glass
- Frameless door, templated after tile
Where to go next
Questions about this project
- Is a tile shower worth it over another acrylic unit?
- It depends on how long you plan to stay and what you want the room to feel like. Acrylic is faster and cheaper; tile on a bonded membrane is a longer-lived assembly and is the only option if you want a custom footprint, niche or bench.
- Can you work around one working bathroom?
- Yes, and we plan the sequence around it. The out-of-service window is driven by cure and inspection times, not by how fast anyone works.
Other projects
Curbless Tile Shower — Meridian, Idaho
An oversized corner garden tub and a 36-inch shower traded for one curbless wet area with a linear drain, a full-depth bench and a flush transition to the bathroom floor.
Read the case study
Tub-to-Shower Conversion — Boise North End
A 1920s North End bathroom where the original cast-iron tub came out and a low-curb tiled shower went in, inside the same 60-inch alcove and the same tight floor plan.
Read the case study
Leaking Shower Pan Rebuild — Nampa, Idaho
A stain on the ceiling below the bathroom traced to a mortar-bed pan with no usable membrane. The wet area was stripped to framing and rebuilt as a fully bonded system.
Read the case study
Planning a similar project?
Tell us what the room is doing today and what you want instead. We follow up to arrange a walkthrough and a written estimate.