Purpose of a bathroom niche?

In My Humble Opinion
61

I bet we have a winner!

You have forgotten about the “Trimline” flavor of landline phone. E.g.:

Those wall-mount just fine. And that niche would fit that phone like a glove. The 7th image in that Amazon link shows how to do a wall-mount installation. That Amazon phone of course is a (sorta) modern device with memory, batteries, etc. But it’s the same form factor as the original 1960s Ma Bell dumb POTS phone.

Back in the day the real Bell System Trimline phones required a 110v outlet to power the backlit buttons. It would still make & receive calls and ring just fine without the wall wart, but if you wanted the backlighting, you had to have a wall wart.

Given the age of the house, this may very well have been a builder original feature that was so tres moderne at the time. Imagine the convenience of taking a call in the bathroom! Isn’t 1965 great!


Separate idea ...

I had something vaguely similar in my last condo. I bought it from the mad tinkerer who did a full remodel. So I had the benefit over the OP of seeing all his wacky innovations as he was actually using them. And I could talk to him about why (and how) he’d done what he had done. Some of his … features … were clever and versatile, but most of them were very, very single-use and were mostly a burden to me once I owned the place.

The condo had an oddly shaped master bathroom. The odd room shape wasn’t his fault; the condo had been built that way. But how he made use of the oddness was … odd in several ways.

Anyhow, he had a ~6"x6"x6" niche in the master bathroom. With a 110v outlet and a CATV connection. As he used it, there was a ~14" flat panel vid monitor / TV on a swivel wall mount that was installed into the niche. So the monitor could sit flush to the wall with all the swivel mechanism hiding inside the niche. When seated on the throne the TV was right there above and to your right at about standing eye level.

It was also off to the side of the double sink. You could pull on the edge of the monitor and it’d pivot to face your ear while you were shaving or tooth-brushing or whatever. A quick glance to your right and there was the TV. How convenient. ???

This guy lurved him some TVs. The condo was 3 bedroom, 2.5 bathroom, ~2000sf. He lived there alone after his wife had died a couple years previously. 7 televisions. The few times I visited the place while he was there, they were all on & blaring. Uggh; not my style. But to each their own.

62

Possible. The link gives a width of 2.99". My initial phone measure of the niche came out as 3.5" - I said approx 4" in the OP. Might have been a tad tight squeeze to comfortably grab the handset…

63

Though those landline phones operated on line power, so the power outlet wasn’t for that.

64

Those round, 3-prong outlets are unfamiliar to me. Maybe they give a clue as to when the room was remodeled.

65

I’m betting on this. Second guess is an illuminated religious icon.

66

Correct. The trimline would not have needed an outlet.

67

Quoting myself for emphasis:


it’d be useful if there was a pic that showed the outlet as anything but a dark gray blob in a black hole.

If you mean it’s an ordinary 110v 3-prong connector, but the overall face of the outlet is circular, those are 100% the standard even today for single outlets. We get so used to seeing outlets in the duplex form factor, with two connectors, that we forget what singles look like. The singles are all circular.

You probably have one just like that under your kitchen sink that powers your garbage disposal. e.g. Leviton 15 Amp Commercial Grade Tamper Resistant Single Outlet, White R52-T5015-0WS - The Home Depot.

68

It is the same as the one below the niche, next to the vanity. I was surprised to see the Leviton ones offered, as I could not recall having seen them often. Our prior home built in the 70s had som features that were unfamiliar to us - like pushmatic circuit breakers, which were “innovative” at the time, but did not catch on.

69

The transformer didn’t have to be right next to the phone. I have seen (and lived in) homes where there was a central transformer near the phone distribution panel and power conducted over the unused pair of a conventional telephone 2-pair wire (phone was red and green, power was black and yellow).

But a princess-type phone might fit in there, barely.

70

Well… here’s my weird bathroom niche:

Imgur

House built in 1949. Is it original to the house? I dunno. The tile sure is and I suppose it could have been added later but I kind of don’t think so. That’s the toilet in the lower left corner and the edge of a cold air return on the lower right. It’s an exterior wall and there’s a window directly above. It’s not a laundry chute that was sealed at a later date. There’s one of those just outside the bathroom door.
The interior dimensions are 12" tall X 9" wide and 5" deep.

What the hell was it’s purpose?

71

Well, if it had an electrical outlet, the answer would be obvious! :wink:

72

Thank you for asking about your niche. I’ve been intending to start a post about mine. (I’m not confident that we will get satisfactory explanations but anyhow…)

Do you have any elderly neighbors who may have spent time in your house? Are there any other homes in your neighborhoods of a similar vintage that might have niches of their own?

73

Reading material storage.

74

Spare roll of TP

75

Hmmm. I think a National Geographic magazine would fit nicely. Perhaps originally there was some sort of framework in there to hold multiple books and/ or magazines. Interesting.

76

Extra bathroom storage, without taking up valuable real estate. Personally, I’d use it for spare toilet paper, but back before cell phones I’d probably store reading material there.

77

Good point. Thank you.

Growing up we had two phone separate numbers and lines, such that there was no spare pair on the standard two-pair four-wire cabling of the time.

78

That reminds me of the house with the nook to the right of the sink. You could reach through into the towel cupboard, the one that had its actual door outside of the bathroom, in the hall.

Once the cat figured it out, we started leaving the towels on the top of the stack alone. They were covered with cat hair.

79

Power supply or no, there is no phone jack in there that I can see.
My cordless extension phone I keep in my office would fit nicely though. It depends on how long ago this niche was built.

80

I’d definitely line it with a nice straw matting.

You know. Thatch that niche.