Toilet Seat Guru

Whether or not the very idea inspires a truckload of horrid film gags, toilet seats have become something of a décor statement in their own right in many homes. Whether a simple wood seat, a simple and understated padded seat, or a decorative seat and cover, there are as many options as there are for such bathroom décor as floor mats, shower curtains, shower doors, and cabinetry.

One mistake that many make when selecting their new seat is forgetting to measure the unit for which it was made in the first place. If your toilet is the elongated style, it is usually 18.6 inches in length up the middle; if your toilet is the regular or round style, it is usually 16.6 inches in length up the middle. Your seat should match the length exactly.

Bemis Manufacturing, whose products include toilet seats especially, offers several styles and even shapes, since toilets are not strictly rounded in shape and some come in slightly squared-looking front ends. Their Model 122, for elongated toilets, is made of molded wood with a shell-like trimming on the cover, with plastic hinges, a high-gloss white finish, and can be installed without tools. (The Model 22 is the same style but made for round toilets.) The Bemis Model 134, another elongated seat, features an ivy design framing the cover and is made of molded wood, likewise with plastic hinges and a high-gloss white finish. This seat also installs without tools.

The Bemis Model 36, for round toilets, features a subdued lighthouse design on the cover and is made of molded wood in a white finish. The company also makes solid oak regular round seat sets–Model 9601 of molded wood with plastic hinges; Model 9601BR with brass hinges; and, Model 9601NI with nickel hinges. For your child’s bathroom, Bemis has brought forth a series of novelty toilet seats with Walt Disney illustrations from such classics as Winnie the Pooh, Cars, The Little Mermaid, and Sleeping Beauty, as well as individual characters such as Mickey Mouse, Tinkerbell, Snow White, and Cinderella.

The Kohler Company—long familiar for its kitchen and bathroom plumbing fixtures—also makes toilet seats including the Quiet Close series. This series features elongated seating with a single wide metal hinge, European-styled contoured wood covers and rings, and a choice of dark or light antique walnut finishes. Kohler also makes a line known as C3; toilet seats touted with bidet functionality featuring two water nozzles for anterior and posterior and made of antimicrobial plastic. This series also features a deodorizer, a heated seat with three temperature settings, side arm controls, and an energy-saving mode. It even includes a sensor, ensuring someone is actually using the seat before any of the above functions are activated.

American Standard has produced a new line of toilet seats it touts as Slow-Close seats, saying they eliminate lid and seat slamming that can be dangerous for small children. Like Kohler and Bemis, American Standard touts these seats, also, as being easy to remove and clean. One stylish example is the Boulevard line, a solid wood ring and lid available in warm walnut, nutmeg, and dark espresso brown finishes, with chrome or satin-finish metal hinges and available for both elongated and regular round toilets. Another is the Cadet 3, a solid plastic cover and ring set with a more traditional styling—even with the raised rim trim atop the lid—and sanitary seat-lift tabs. These, too, are made for elongated and regular round toilets and have easy-cleaning surfaces.

Should you want a designer toilet seat, you can find one through several sources, including BathroomGifts.com. Here you can find regular round seats made of solid acrylic and painted with styles ranging from decorative dolphins and shells, ducks with shells, and tropical fish, to camouflage wood, fishing flies, and dragonflies, among other styles. Then, there is FunkyToiletSeats.com, which advertises hand-crafted original seats with unusual designs and, in some cases, sections—such as their Sharon Tiessen seat that features a two-door lid opening to the sides, with a checkerboard pattern on one door and a flat subdued stripe pattern on the other door.

There is also uniquechicgallery.com, which features hand-painted wood seats and lids that artist Sandra Holland touts as being designed based entirely on the buyer’s personal tastes and preferences. Some samples of this work include an understated lid illustration featuring hummingbirds visiting flowers on a dark wood seat lid; a harlequin diamond lid design based on a customer’s old family photographs and home designs; a painting of deer on a creek framed in a chipped-wood frame image on the lid, based on a homeowner’s passion for hunting; and, an aquarium image in green hues and shades with small shells decorating the front rim of the lid.

Toilet seats and lids have even come painted or glazed in motifs ranging from auto racing (usually, a checkered flag as the design foundation, with anything from small car to small automotive tool imagery), animal prints (leopard, tiger, zebra, and giraffe appear to be the most popular of those), and even royal imagery. Perhaps inspired by dozens of tacky jokes about the throne room, there are even toilet seats emblazoned with images of jewel-encrusted crowns and sometimes made of metals. You can see several of these unusual seats at WorldofKitsch.com and perhaps even buy them from PlumbWorld.com.uk—which also sells more conventional toilet seat sets in more conventional colors and styles.

A hunt for the toilet seat that best fits a toilet and the bathroom décor does not necessarily have to be expensive, even if there will be times when the lowest prices indicate the least materials. For one example, the Church 28EC—a molded wood regular round seat and lid with a sculptured rose pattern on the lid, a multi-coated enamel finish, and easy-install plastic hinges—sells as low as $16.99 in outlets such as Ace Hardware.

For Eljer toilets, however, finding replacement seats is not simple—the company itself does not make them. However, if you visit LockPlumbing.com, you can get a line on replacement seats that will fit most Eljer models, including their unusual near-square Emblem, Triangle, and Febe toilet models.