Comment by decimalenough
2 days ago
I once stayed at a very boutiquey, avant-garde hotel with a platonic friend. We had booked a twin room with separate beds, but what I did not expect was that the shower cubicle, with clear glass on all three sides, would be placed between the beds.
In London's Shard, the gent's toilets of the observation deck (on approx the 70th floor) have glass walls behind the urinals so if you look straight ahead while using them it is as if you are peeing on the city of London from a great height.
The old Warner stand at Lord's cricket ground used to be where the press watched from (before the new Media Centre was built). The urinals in old stand used to have windows above them looking out over the pitch so that the journalists wouldn't miss anything whilst they urinated.
Image: https://d3rcx32iafnn0o.cloudfront.net/Pictures/980x653fitpad...
The three square windows under the second tier, just below where the sportingbet.com and Jaguar advertising boards meet.
I always enjoy a "loo with a view", including that one at the Shard. I also enjoyed the outdoor one I utilized in Botswana that had the toilet isolated from camp behind a small wooden fence, but while sitting on the throne you are facing out from a slight elevation onto a sweeping 180 degree view of the savanna, with antelopes, giraffes, and elephants roaming around.
The W in Santiago, Chile, has a full-length floor-to-ceiling glass window in the shower, with the morning sun shining right in. Your other option is a bathtub set in the middle of the bedroom itself. Mercifully the WC has a door.
Pretty sure I went to a bar in NYC that still had a urinal trough running directly below the bar as you were standing there... so one wouldn't need to leave the bar to take a leak. This was 30 years ago. McSorleys maybe?
It could be a spittoon, which is designed for chewing tobacco. https://www.kegworks.com/blog/a-lesson-in-tavern-history-the...
But it seems like they also where used as urinals
"Back in my day," Lake Helen (~10,000 ft) on Mt. Shasta had a pit toilet without walls that faced the valley. Depending on the weather, it could even be above the clouds/fog and IIRC on a clear day you could see the ocean.
I've been on something similar in Washington State. Forget where. Maybe below Shuksan someplace. While wilderness experiences are obviously a different matter, I suspect that people here freaking out about lack of doors or whatever wouldn't necessarily be comfortable with how many deal with climbing/camping/canoeing/etc. People just look the other way.
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Wilderness privvies often make up for in view what they lack in privacy and/or plumbing technology. I've similar memories from elsewhere.
Not the Platonic ideal of a hotel room
No, but I bet the shower was a decent approximation of a Platonic solid.
I like to leave my platonic solids in the toilet bowl.
Such an odd decision. No privacy or isolation for the shower, but yes for the two twin beds. Sleep apart but shower together.
My SO and I move and snore, not a bad arrangement. Somehow I don't think that's what they were going for though.
It builds tension
There's a hotel in Edinburgh with boutique pretensions I stayed in that had smoked glass (only) around the toilet. That was a pretty annoying arrangement for me and my wife. Luckily they had regular loos in reception.
was it a travelodge? with that smoked glass bathrom being right behind the bed?
It was "The Hub by Premier Inn". There are some photos on Google.
In between the beds?? Does that mean the shower was right in the middle of the room ? So that it would be impossible to place a double bed ? This is the weirdest part to me
That's how platonic friendships usually end.
Beauty lies in the eye of the beholder..
It's called foreplay. Jk.
I've seen a glass shower where the glass turned to smoked opaque glass with the push of a button. Maybe this shower had something similar?
But this is no excuse, still completely awkward and horrible design.
The world makes full circle. A 4-toilet (2 facing the other 2 for lively conversation) bathroom per floor, no walls whatsoever between the toilets, "open layout" so to speak, in our dormitory in high school (regional school for advanced science studies) in USSR in 80-ies come to mind. Looks like we were living the boutiquey avant-garde way of the future :)
Seeing it was advanced science, authorities wanted to add venues to encourage constant communication and collaboration. Always working for the people and the state! No time wasted.
We pretend to shit and they pretend to pay us
This is similar to the arrangements of public toilets in ancient Rome, except for them the seats are arrangemed in a circle. Everything old is new again.
Sounds like the various RAF bases I did stints at as a cadet - the ablutions were just a great big room full of loos, showers, and bathtubs, all with dark brown water, and absolutely zero privacy of any variety.
The exposed loos were a novelty for me, at school we at least had shoulder height partitions - but we had communal showers and baths so it wasn’t a huge leap.
I also spent a year or so living in a studio where the loo was in the kitchen area - we at least installed a curtain.
> RAF
On a trip I took with my father-in-law, the first morning he waltzed right into the little hotel room bathroom while I was showering (in a glass shower) and proceeded to sit on the throne and take a crap. I was confused at his lack of basic respect for privacy, and then remembered he'd been a US Navy guy for many years. Military folks just get used to no privacy in such matters.
> but we had communal showers and baths so it wasn’t a huge leap.
I dunno, I've no problem with communal showers, or nudity in general, but partition-less toilets feels like a bridge too far.
Kitchen-loo must be illegal these days - I think rentals need to have 2 doors between the two. Did it seem reasonable at the time?!
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They had built some of those for the Olympics in Sochi, if memory serves.. :-)
> 80-ies
eighty...ies? eightieies? why not just "80s"?
English is not their first language so please give them a break ;)
Edit: I realize you are probably trying to help them learn. Carry on.
Had two toilets in my flat only parted with a thin wood wall. Better talking with another one that is shitting than playing on the smartphone.
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"Some artists are communists".
I went looking for pictures (someone must have shared this on internet ...). This is the closes I could find https://www.reddit.com/r/CrappyDesign/comments/if6ahf/the_sh...
In my high school the toilet stalls had no doors and the walls were only about waist high brick walls. Horrific
I've only really encountered glass walls for the shower room in Asia, and in almost every case there's been a curtain that could be drawn across the glass if required.
Please tell my that you have pictures of this to show!
Wouldn’t be very platonic to take pictures.
Was it a "love hotel" because...that doesn't sound like a regular hotel?
That bathroom layout has become extremely common in normal hotels in parts of Asia and the Middle East.
But what's the logic? I have never seen it but it doesn't sound good even aesthetically (which is usually the justification for all kinds of violations of common sense). So what are they thinking?
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Where is Asia? I travel there often for work and have never come across such a layout
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I live in Asia, I've only seen in love hotels.