Restau-rooms.

Here's a little piece of advice for all you diners out there: check out the restrooms BEFORE you put in your order. You can tell a lot about a restaurant by the cleanliness of its water closets.

As top chef Anthony Bourdain puts it "I won't eat in a restaurant with filthy bathrooms. This isn't a hard call. They let you see the bathrooms. If the restaurant can't be bothered to replace the puck in the urinal or keep the toilets and floors clean, then just imagine what their refrigeration and work spaces look like." (Kitchen Confidential, 2000)

On the other hand, the loo can also be a haven for restauranteurs and staff alike. Some restrooms are beautiful, artistic and fun. Check out these interesting restau-room finds.

Let's be real here for a second. What's the best part of a restroom and what makes up 50% of the reason we're going there in the middle of dinner?... the mirror. Women (and men!) around the world thrive in the presence of floor to ceiling mirrors. Big mirrors mean a confident, happy clientele. The lavatory at The Modern Restaurant in midtown Manhattan allows you to check on your rouge and make sure the straps of your stilettos are still locked and loaded in one fell swoop of the eye thanks to these massive mirrors and flattering light tubes.

On a less classy but equally awesome note, I present to you the Rolling Stones of restrooms located at R-bar in Brighton, England. Pretty cheeky, indeed:

(canpages.ca)

Here's a more classic looking restroom with some nice bright colors contrasting the sleek masculine tiles at Chat Thai restaurant in Sydney, Australia.

(stilgherrian.com)

Most bowl sinks have a way of making a WC look elegant and refined much like this one at Buddha Bar in downtown Manhattan:


And sometimes you don't even need to make the trek to the back of the restaurant in order to get the restroom feel. The restaurant "Modern Toilet" in Taiwan literally has its diners sitting on toilets and the dishes are served in mini toilet bowls. It's not quite my thing... but hey, we're talking restrooms here, this couldn't be left out:

(thebuilderblog.wordpress.com)

And if you're not completely grossed out yet... here's a video of a pretty interesting toilet concept in a cafe in Akashi, Japan: