What ever you choose to call the toilet in your bathroom(s) the universal use is the same. The American word water closet has made its way across the continents on its journey Trans-Atlantic and on route became the ‘WC’ so whether you like your toilet WC or water closet to be a wall hung, back to the wall or close couple version, lets take a look at the evolution of this one humble and very much taken for granted every day bathroom item.
The water closet or toilet as us ‘brits’ prefer to call them is not such a modern marvel as we would like to think. General conception is that the toilet or WC was the invention of the Victorians; this is far from the truth. Nearly 3000 years ago King Minos of Greece became the very proud owner of the world’s first flushing toilet, a household object that only the rich and privileged could benefit from.
The lower classes in general relieved themselves wherever they could and wherever they happened to be, not something that would appeal to modern society today where the good old toilet or WC is highly regarded as a very public and personal necessity. The Romans developed a latrine system, a very simple toilet system that was reliant on a watercourse to carry away waste down to a river and then eventually out to sea.
The marvel of the flushing toilet disappeared into the horizon and was not pulled back out of the ‘closet’ so to speak until thousands of years later. Chamber pots became the cheaper solution to the toilet, providing quick relief for the user in the night. Unfortunately the contents were more than often discarded out of the nearest window the next morning and with most people living in tight housing conditions and in slums the consequence of the disposal of waste from these very primitive toilets does not really bear being given too much though.
Sir John Harrington, god son of Queen Elizabeth I invented a flushing style of toilet for her personal usage in 1596 again it was the privileged that reaped the benefits of this, ‘reinvention’ named the Ajax. Although Harrington wrote a book about his invention ‘the toilet’, people rather than embracing his idea, where repelled by it and continued rather than looking to install toilets in their homes to use the cheaper, less unhygienic chamber pot.
The Intervention of the Law
The previous action that we have discussed caused disease to flourish and the crowed conditions due to the industrialisation led to serious sanitary and health conditions arising, it was said that in Leeds a member of the community had described the streets as ‘floating with sewage’. Millions of people in Europe began to die of disease, there where riots and the UK government passed a law that held that every house hold should have some type of flushing bathroom toilet or privy these flushing toilets were basically the same design that he been invented by John Harrington over 150 years earlier.
Introduction of the Cistern
The rather aptly named Thomas Crapper, further improved the design of the toilet or WC with the introduction of a cistern not the modern streamline toilet cisterns that we know of today and refer to with names such as close couple, cistern or close couple toilet, but a high level cistern that stored water for flushing. The toilet became to be recognised as a status symbol and the fancier it was the better, something the opulence of the Victorian era embraced.
The Toilet the next ‘big’ Commodity
Young entrepreneurs began to see that with every household by law having to have a toilet, and with the toilet being seen as a sign of prosperity and wealth, it would be a good venture to be in. Architect Isaiah Rogers designer of the Tremont Hotel in Boston, went down in history as creating the first hotel to have a plumbing system that could accommodate eight toilets, or water closets as they so called them. By the mid 1860’s the demand for the humble toilet had increased 10 fold with wealthy Americans demanding that they be imported into the USA for use in their homes. One of the names synonymous with toilet design today as back then is Twyford the company today remains a world leader in design of the modern toilet, in the 21st century the toilet has even made it’s entry into space.
Todays Toilet Guide
The roca element range features compact pieces, ideal for a smaller bathroom with simple clean lines. The Roca elements suite was created by architect David Chipperfield. The chunky style of the element range creates an authoritative and distinctive bathroom style. The minimal design creates maximum effect for a unique focal point in the bathroom.