My affair with clawfoot tubs has ended

I used to think Victorian tubs were the bee’s knees. Well-made and attractive, they represent a bygone era when craftsmanship was king and a house’s fixtures, furniture, and appliances were built to last. Lately, though, I’m feeling less in love with the clawfoot tub in my 1920s Chicago apartment.

My first clawfoot tub was in the very first apartment I had to myself, a charming and relatively spacious studio in Ann Arbor, Michigan. My first experience living alone and my first clawfoot tub also corresponded with my getting my first (and so far only) cat. It didn’t take long to see that one of the downsides of the gorgeous old tub was that it was impossible to clean under (heck, I couldn’t even see what was under there), which struck me as a bad combination with an energetic and curious kitten. Without fail, any time I left the bathroom door open, the cat would head straight underneath the tub into lord only knows what kind of filth. Before long, I decided to keep the bathroom door shut at all times.

I moved on to other apartments and eventually a new city. When I chose my current apartment six years ago, I viewed its clawfoot tub as a selling point. I didn’t count on a repeat of the problems in my Ann Arbor apartment because by then the cat had mellowed and the Swiffer had been invented. I even found a couple of faux-antique ceramic tiles with a Victorian tub motif, one clawfoot and one pedestal, to hang on the bathroom wall.

But now I’m having a change of heart. Wrapping two shower curtains around the tub while showering never quite works out, and I always end up with water on the wall and floor. Twice this week, as has happened many times before, an integral shower accessory (soap, razor) slipped from my hands and wedged itself into the filthy space between the tub, the wall, pipes, and the floor. The Swiffer can only keep a floor so clean, after all.

For the past couple months I’ve been condo hunting. The three places on which I’ve made offers have at least one thing in common: None of them has a clawfoot tub. A pedestal sink, a vessel sink, and that’s OK… but the tubs are modern, a little vanilla, and comfortingly practical.