Part 1: Making Your Shower Look Like New

In this series, we will be discussing the place where most of us wake up in the morning... the shower.  

A typical shower lasts about 10 minutes. If we take one per day (some of us more, some less) it means we will spend about 60 hours a year standing in our showers. Multiply that by the number of users and we start to realize that our showers see a lot of traffic.  

In my home, the shower is one of our least favorite places to clean. As our showers have gotten older, it seems that no matter how often we clean them, they just don't look good anymore... especially the tile showers.  

The grout is becoming stained and the caulk joints always look dirty even after they have been scrubbed (more on that later). 

In this series, I hope to visit some practical tips on why tile showers degrade, why they are hard to clean and what options we have when we decide to repair or improve our showers.

Let's start out with the weaknesses of most tile showers. The first weakness is the grout.  This is the material that fills the cracks in between the tiles. It is there for three main reasons: to enhance the appearance of the tile, to act as a buffer between the tile edges, and to stop water from penetrating the wall.  What most people do not realize is that most grout is quite porous and actually does a fairly bad job at stopping water penetration. There are some grouts that claim to be more waterproof but they also have limitations.

The second weakness: if your home was constructed in the past 40 years, there is a strong chance that behind your tile is a product commonly referred to as "green board."  Green-board, or water-resistant drywall (the more generic term), was conceived in the 1960's to be used in high-moisture areas like bathrooms, kitchens, laundry rooms, etc.  This "wonder product" of the day was immediately embraced as a tile backer.  It wasn't until many years later that it became clear that this was a huge error.  But that didn't stop most of the industry from continuing to use it and from recommending it.  Even today,  you have a 50/50 chance of getting that advice at the big box stores, despite much better available options.  Here's the problem, water-resistant (WR) drywall is highly absorbent when the moisture is held against it.  Connecting the dots yet?

Essentially, what happens is every time you shower, your grout takes in water and holds it against the WR drywall.  Over time, the WR drywall becomes hyper-absorbent from the constant wetting and drying cycle and eventually starts to break down.  Because WR drywall is made up of organic products (paper and gypsum), this breakdown under wet conditions causes fungal growth and even some chemical reactions.  Remember the discoloration in the grout lines and caulk lines we were talking about earlier?  Much of it is coming from this reaction behind the tile.  You scrub it away on the surface and in a few days it's back!  It just leaches to the surface as your WR drywall tries to dry itself to the open air.  Thought you were losing your mind, right?

Check back next week for Part 2, where we cover some immediate solutions to these problems and after that, Part 3 where we cover shower renovation and remodeling.

Let's get smart about our homes!