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DIY Small Bathroom Remodel | Bath Renovation Project

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A cramped, builder-grade bathroom gets torn down to the studs — and rebuilt without a single tile trowel in sight.

Brad Rodriguez, the builder behind the YouTube channel Fix This Build That, spends his latest tutorial gutting a small, contractor-grade bathroom and rebuilding it into something that looks custom-tiled but isn’t. The project, sponsored by The Home Depot, walks through every stage of a bath renovation — demo, plumbing, wall surround, and finish work — aimed squarely at DIYers who want a high-end result without hiring a tile setter.

• The centerpiece of the remodel is the Delta UPstile Bath and Shower Kit, a hybrid wall surround built to mimic classic white subway tile without individual tiles or porous grout lines.
• The UPstile panels include a built-in channel that lets Rodriguez embed a real strip of accent tile directly into the surround, blending prefab convenience with custom tile detail.
• The rough-in work covers a flexible waste-and-overflow system and a Delta shower valve, followed by finish work: a new toilet, an updated vanity, new lighting, and final caulking.

Prefab Surrounds Outperform Grout Lines

Rodriguez’s starting point is a bathroom every homeowner recognizes: a small, builder-basic shower surround that’s functional but forgettable. Rather than laying subway tile piece by piece, he installs the Delta UPstile Bath and Shower Kit, which delivers the same visual — clean white subway-style panels — without the labor of setting individual tiles or the long-term headache of scrubbing mold out of grout lines. For anyone who’s tackled a full room overhaul before, the appeal is the same logic behind skipping load-bearing demolition shortcuts: get the finished look without the riskiest, most time-consuming step. Readers who want that broader gut-and-rebuild context can see it laid out in How To: Removing a Load Bearing Wall! (EASY STEP-BY-STEP).

The UPstile System’s Built-In Tile Channel

What separates the UPstile kit from a standard acrylic surround is a channel molded into the panel itself, designed to let installers embed an actual strip of accent tile into the wall. That means the surround isn’t purely prefabricated — Rodriguez still gets to bring in real tile for a custom accent band, he just doesn’t have to tile the entire wet wall to get it. It’s a middle path between a fully tiled shower and a one-piece insert, and it’s the detail that turns this from a generic panel swap into a remodel with some design intention behind it.

The look of subway tile, the maintenance of a one-piece surround — no grout lines to scrub, no tile to set.

Demolition and the Plumbing Rough-In

Before any surround goes up, Rodriguez tears the old bathroom down to bare studs and subfloor, clearing out the dated fixtures and prepping the walls for the new panel system. The plumbing rough-in is where the technical work happens: he runs a flexible waste-and-overflow system for the tub and installs a Delta shower valve behind the wall, both of which have to be positioned precisely before the UPstile panels can be mounted. Wall prep and surround mounting follow, turning what was bare framing into a finished wet wall in a fraction of the time a full tile job would take.

Finish Work That Sells the Remodel

With the shower surround in, Rodriguez moves through the finish list that makes a remodel actually look finished: a new toilet, a modern vanity with updated fixtures, refreshed overhead lighting, and a final round of caulking to seal every seam. It’s the same sequence that turns a construction zone into a livable room in any renovation, whether it’s a bathroom or a full interior repaint job like the one covered in HUGE TRANSFORMATION | Painting The Interior. By the time the caulk gun comes out, the small, contractor-grade bathroom Rodriguez started with is gone, replaced by a space built around one hybrid shower kit and a handful of well-chosen fixture upgrades.