Home improvement: Is it better to have a separate loo and bathroom?

Should your loo leave the suite? We flush out the issues that drive us to divide and show how to give the loo its own space 

Your WC doesn't have to be a dungeon; HIB Fabrica pictured here, supplied by Shivers Bathrooms.

Several readers have asked me, flame-faced, if separate toilets are worth considering. I thought this issue was just an oddity, rolling around in my head. Family bathrooms are often completely engaged just because the toilet is in use. 

This can be maddening with a larger brood, and right up into the 1980s, a separate toilet nestled by a family bathroom was familiar in homes all over Ireland.