Grade: A-
Not bad. Not bad at all. Decorative tile, auto-flushing toilet, great water temperature at the sink, beautiful lighting. The one problem - and it's a big one - is that the lock on the door was broken. That's fine for the urinal, but it's hard to use the toilet in a one-y with a non-locking door.
Grade: B+
The Boutique Hotel Palacio in Santo Domingo's Zona Colonial is a 3-star hotel, and its bathrooms - at least in the so-called "Superior Rooms" - reflect such a rating. They are bright, attractive, practical and comfortable. They come with faux-marble wall and floor tiles, open shower stalls with hand showers, and two toilet flushing options for conserving water. There are phones mounted on the walls beside the toilets, I assume for making phone calls while sitting on the toilet. The restrooms also offer butt hoses - Is that what they're called? I'm calling them butt hoses - for the hosing off of butts. And please see the photo of the decoratively folded spare toilet paper roll. Wow.
So these are A+ restrooms, right? Not quite. Notice I've been speaking of the facilities in the plural. We started off in one room, but woke one morning to find an ever-expanding pool of water in front of the sink. The ceiling was dripping water. We reported it, and the issue was somehow fixed within an hour (we suspect they may have shut off a valve somewhere). The next morning, the leak was back and the ceiling was dripping in even more places. They promptly moved us to a new room, with a bigger restroom and an automatic faucet where our previous room had a manual one. This mess and inconvenience was enough to knock the restrooms down a full letter grade.
(Please note the photos below are of the second, larger, restroom.)
Grade: D+
Unexceptional and not in great shape. Interesting tile theme, but the soap dispenser broke off in my hand. Ran into a stoic dude I casually know but hadn't spoken with in a long time. Our conversations are always supremely awkward, but it was even weirder when I tried to explain why I was taking photographs.
Grade: C-
Superficial decorative flourishes disguise an otherwise pedestrian - even somewhat rundown - restroom. One of the sinks has no water pressure to speak of, but the other is quite powerful and offers good water temperature. The wall paint has seen better days. The biggest issue is that the door takes a very long time to swing shut, leaving the back of the person at the urinal exposed to the restaurant for a significant amount of time.
Also: this is a (quite good) Mexican restaurant. What's with the Miller Lite poster?
Grade: B
What this restroom lacks in amenities - it's about as basic as you get, with utilitarian tiles, one toilet, one urinal, one sink and manual everything - it makes up for in privacy. In all my time using this bathroom, I have come across one other person while inside. I don't know if it's the out-of-the-way location or the relatively low number of men on Chatham's campus. Either way, it's a great place to get away and relax.
Grade: A
Entirely decent for a university campus restroom, especially in a fitness center. Clean, decorative tiles, foam soap, Rihanna's "Umbrella" blasting over the radio (this, of course, was coincidence). Only thing that could have pushed it into the realm of the truly elite would have been auto flushing/sinks/dispensers. Recommended, if you get a chance to check it out.
