FANBOYS

Grammar, anyone?  I recently used this acronym to teach my students about coordinating conjunctions (for, and, nor, but, or, yet, so)—and what better way to start off a post about a fan that coordinates with the rest of the bathroom—and it just so happens that it was installed by a boy!  And yes, we’re starting Shakespeare this week—but since not everyone appreciates them as much as me, I promise to do my very best to hold back all the puns that will surely be racing through my mind.

Alright, here’s the down and dirty of it.  Our bathroom had a bizarre window in the shower, so we popped it out and made a cohesive wall of subway tile instead.  Love the subway tile, by the way.  Apparently someone made a law that bathrooms must have either a window or a fan in order for air to vent, so we turned to our trusted friend, the HD.  As it turns out, fans are downright sterile looking these days.  I’m convinced that someone could make a good living just by redesigning some of the fans out there—and selling them at affordable prices.  But working within our budget, we determined to find a functional fan that was not a total eyesore.  Here were some of our options—and these are the good ones!

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We decided to go with the simple look of this fan, since it looked more like a normal light fixture, rather than a vent cover.

Since we want our house to be people-friendly, I wanted to make sure that the sound of the fan was adequate.  Too loud and it would be annoying.  Too soft and people hanging out in the living room might hear your business…you know?  That’s when we spotted a handy little contraption right in the middle of the fan aisle that allowed us to test out the noise level of our fan.  Bingo!  We were satisfied.

Before we installed our fan light, I worried that it would interfere with our extra tall shower curtain.  While it comes pretty close to the bar, it actually doesn’t look too awkward, and there’s never been an issue of our curtain bumping up against it.

In an effort to be more energy efficient, we screwed in some CFL bulbs—only to be creeped out by the bluish lighting they emitted.  Seriously, I felt like at any moment aliens would burst out of our light fixture.  At first we thought the weird lighting was just due to the face that we’d used CFL bulbs.  But after a second trip to HD (we pretty much count on a minimum of two trips at this point—although we’re getting better at buying several types just to be sure we have what we need), we discovered that there are soft CFL bulbs that are far less harsh and offer a look similar to that of an incandescent bulb.  They worked!  (I do feel the need to make a confession, since we’re on the topic of light bulbs.  I am a huge fan of soft, cozy lighting.  Even though the soft CFL bulbs are close, I do not love them as much as an old-fashioned light bulb—they’re just a bit too bright for my taste.  The good news is that they’re getting better all the time, as companies are working to merge the soft look with energy conscious technology.)

One final look.

And we’re happy to report that the fan light correlates nicely with the Pottery Barn light that we purchased to hang over our sink.

Both have a milky glass look that we love, as it’s more opaque, giving it a fresh feel.  Yup, you could say we’re fans of the way things worked out in our bathroom.