For Stand-Up Guys, No Home Is Complete Without One of These
A year ago, Ben Jones asked his wife if he could have a urinal.
"No way. Absolutely not," Gina Jones told her husband.
The 40-year-old San Antonio-area magazine publisher kept after her. The fixture would be perfect in the first-floor bathroom of their new house, he said, near the door to the deck.
Mr. Jones then went with his wife to a plumbing-supply store where they were shown an American Standard catalog. The showroom manager pointed out the $91 Maybrook model and noted that it would help keep the bathroom floor dry, particularly when the Joneses entertain.
"OK," Ms. Jones, an attorney, finally told her husband, after all the cajoling, "but you're going to clean it."
The device was unveiled at a party over the Memorial Day weekend. Mr. Jones recalls the reaction from his high-fiving buddies: "You got a urinal. Awesome! How'd you talk your wife into that?"
After their long confinement to public restrooms, urinals are creeping into American homes. A big reason: big houses, with spacious new bathrooms.
Roughly 325,000 urinals are manufactured every year in the U.S., and almost all of them still go into offices, stadiums and other commercial spaces. Nobody tracks residential installations, but officials at two big makers of toilets, American Standard Cos. and Kohler Co., say they're hearing about more of them. Atlanta plumber Tom Ward says that in his first 19 years in the business he didn't install a single home urinal. In the past seven years, he has installed 10. Designers say they are incorporating more urinals into bathroom plans. They are particularly appreciated in homes with young boys.
Home urinals are popping up on TV. Ozzy Osborne has one in his California home. New York Jets running back Curtis Martin showed his off on MTV's "Cribs." He recommends urinals to all men, so their wives won't bug them about putting down the seat.
Also, they are a point of pride. "She is a 1983 Eljer with a chrome-on-brass 1968 Haws freeze-resistant flush valve ... which has been in service since 1991 when I recycled her," wrote Mike Shepherd, who submitted that caption along with a urinal photo to
www.urinal.net, a site launched by two Silicon Valley software developers. Mr. Shepherd lives in Aguila, Ariz., a tiny desert community with three home urinals he knows of.
U.S. urinal makers have long recognized that their models lacked a certain domesticity. In 1888, J.L. Mott Iron Works in New York addressed the issue by offering a porcelain-lined device that could be folded up into the wall like a Murphy bed. "It has been our desire for many years," the company wrote in its catalog, "to get a urinal ... that would be adapted for private use in all rooms set aside for gentlemen's use, such as billiard and smoking rooms, private offices, etc."
But it was the commercial walk-ups that continued to dominate the industry. And they were rarely welcomed in mixed company. In 1917, the New York Society of Independent Artists famously rejected Marcel Duchamp's piece called "Fountain." Mr. Duchamp had taken a standard urinal basin, rotated it onto its back and in so doing posed the question: What is art? The piece was lost, but four years ago a reproduction sold for $1.76 million at a Sotheby's auction.
Women's Room
American Standard keeps an eye on attitudes about urinals. Gary Uhl, the company's head of bath and kitchen design in its Americas division, says many women consider the bathroom a sanctuary. "A urinal is just so overtly male they don't want to invite it in," he says. Mr. Uhl himself quit asking his wife for one six years ago, he says: "We have a good relationship in my house, and I work to keep it that way."
Such disagreements can sometimes be overcome by distance -- building separate male and female wings within the master bath, for example. More broadly, homeowners increasingly want fixtures and features that can become conversation pieces, says Janice Costa, editor of Kitchen & Bath Design News, a monthly magazine. "The urinal, in some ways, follows the bidet. You're starting to see more come into the home."
Refinancings also play a role. Families often spend the money to finish out their basements, outfitting them with pool tables, huge TVs, bars, and, increasingly, urinals, says Glen Andrews, head of the Atlanta office of Ferguson Enterprises, a nationwide building-products company based in Newport News, Va.
B.A. Farrell, owner of the Total Concept, a home-design business in Raleigh, N.C., says that women often can't get past the first two syllables of the word. So Mr. Farrell has begun telling clients to call the device "a rose." From there, he's free to explain how the fixtures save water and allow plush carpeting to come into bathrooms.
"If they'd just change the name and market them better," he says, "they couldn't make them fast enough."
Flush With Options
Urinals are a great project for the serious handyman. Outside Elk Rapids, Mich., John Shepherd (no relation to Mike Shepherd) wanted something unique for his basement -- near the 10-seat home theater he built last year. The 52-year-old Web designer and pizza-parlor cook ordered a urinal from a plumbing supply house for $210. Behind a wall, he rigged up a 15-gallon water-pressure tank. (Water pressure can sometimes be an issue at existing-home installations.)
He installed an electric solenoid valve, wiring that into a used Bendix switchbox he had long ago purchased for $6.95 at a military surplus store. He then bolted the box above and to the right of the urinal. Users who want a quick flush push a button. Those who want a continuous flush flick up on a toggle. Two weeks ago, Mr. Shepherd installed another urinal upstairs. "They're really handy," he says.
In Columbia, Md., John Maitland says his urinal is popular with the members of "A.M. Wednesday," a weekly gathering of 25 to 30 guys who come to his basement, sip coffee brewed in a 100-cup urn, and talk for two hours. Most are World War II veterans. And the gatherings serve as something of a support group. Artificial hips, cancer and quadruple bypasses are among the subjects touched on. Mr. Maitland, 75, always shows new members the urinal, which he bought at a plumbing supply house and installed himself.
Some men go all out. Flip Chalfant, a professional photographer in Atlanta, had a home urinal installed when he and his wife built an addition to their house three years ago. The floor-length fixture has its own alcove, with an arched, tiled ceiling that nicely picks up other architectural accents of the home. "It's a little over the top," Mr. Chalfant admits.
卫浴间的"一朵玫瑰"
一年前，本?琼斯(Ben Jones)问他的妻子他可否在家里安装一个小便池。
"没门儿，绝对不行。"妻子吉娜?琼斯(Gina Jones)告诉他。
这位40岁的圣安东尼奥地区的杂志发行商一再请妻子满足他的这一要求。他说，将小便池安装在他们新居二楼浴室的门边再合适不过。
之后，琼斯先生和妻子来到了卫浴设备商店，翻阅了美标(American Standard)的产品目录。陈列厅经理向他们推荐了售价91美元的Maybrook型号小便池，并指出，该产品有助于保持浴室地面的乾燥，特别是在他们招待客人的时候。
"好吧。"在琼斯先生的百般"哄骗"之下，身为律师的琼斯太太终于妥协了，"但你自己负责清洗。"
阵亡将士纪念日的周末舞会上，琼斯家的这个新装置初次被大家所知。据琼斯先生回忆，他的朋友们对此惊讶不已："你竟然安装了小便池，太不可思议了！你是怎么说服你太太的？"
长期以来仅在公共卫生间可见的小便池正悄然进入美国家庭。其中一个主要原因是，在大房子中，浴室空间极为宽敞。
在美国，每年生产的小便池约有3.25万个，其中绝大多数仍被用于写字楼、体育场以及其他商用建筑。对于家用小便池的使用没有资料可用，但根据两大卫浴设备制造商美标和科勒(Kohler Co.)的管理人士称，家用便池正日益增多。亚特兰大卫浴设备安装工汤姆?沃德(Tom Ward)称，在他工作以来的最初十九年里从未安装过家用小便池。但在过去七年，他安装了十个。设计师表示，他们在家庭浴室设计方案中开始更多的考虑小便池。在住有年轻男士的住宅里，这种设计尤其受到青睐。
家用小便池在电视上也频频亮相。著名艺人奥兹?奥斯
朋(Ozzy Osborne)在加利福尼亚州家中就有一个。全美橄榄球联盟纽约喷射机队(New York Jets)的跑锋科蒂斯?马丁(Curtis Martin)在MTV的Cribs节目中展示了他家中的小便池。他向所有男士推荐家用小便池，说这样他们的妻子就不会为放下马桶圈而唠叨了。 另外，家用小便池还是一项值得夸耀的设施。马克?谢菲尔德(Mike Shepherd)向硅谷两个软件开发商设立的网站
www.urinal.net上传了一张小便池的图片，并写道："这是1983年的Eljer牌小便池，配有1968年生产的Haws铜铬合金防冻冲水系统，我自1991年以来一直在用。"谢菲尔德先生住在亚利桑那州的Aguila，据他所知，这个社区有三户使用小便池。
美国小便池制造商很早就认识到，此类产品家庭普及程度很低。1888年，纽约的JL Mott Iron Works推出一种像墨菲床（不用时可折起放进壁橱的床）一样能在墙上折叠起来的瓷制小便池，试图解决这一问题。公司在产品目录中写道："我们多年来的愿望是制造一种适用于台球室、吸烟室和私人办公室等所有绅士专门场所的私用小便池。"
但主导市场的仍是适用于商用建筑的小便池。而且在由各色人等组成的人群中，小便池极少能受到欢迎。1917年，纽约独立艺术家社团(New York Society of Independent Artists)拒绝了马塞尔?杜尚(Marcel Duchamp)的作品"清泉"(Fountain)。"清泉"底座是标准小便池样式，其后方向上旋转延伸，这部作品提出了这样一个问题：什么是艺术？该作品原作现已遗失，但四年后，其复制作品在索斯比(Sotheby)拍卖会上以176万美元的价格售出。
关于人们对小便池的态度，美标一直予以关注。其美洲分公司卫浴和厨房装置设计的负责人盖瑞?盎(Gary Uhl)表示，许多女士将浴室视为一块圣洁的领地。"小便池呈现出过重的男性色彩，因此她们不愿将其请进家中。"盎先生自己早在六年前就放弃了说服妻子安装小便池的打算，"我们的家庭气氛和谐，我要用心维护。"
有时，在这方面的分歧可以利用距离间隔加以避免，比如可以在主浴室两侧分别设置男女卫生间。厨房卫浴设备月刊《厨卫设计动态》(Kitchen & Bath Design News)的编辑嘉耐斯?科斯塔(Janice Costa)表示，越来越多的房主希望住宅拥有一些标新立异的设施。"从某种程度上讲，小便池像洁身器一样迎合了这种需求。你将看到越来越多的小便池进入家庭。"
再融资也在其中发挥了作用。美国装修用品公司Ferguson Enterprises驻亚特兰大办事处的负责人安德鲁斯(Glen Andrews)表示，许多家庭将地下室也花钱装修了，用来设置台球桌，家庭影院，吧台等，并越来越多安装了小便池。
家装设计公司Total Concept所有人法雷尔(B.A. Farrell)称，小便池这个词的前两个字往往让女士听起来感到不舒服，因此他开始让客户将该设施称为"一朵玫瑰"。从此以后，他可以毫无障碍地解释该产品多么节水，且便于浴室铺上长毛绒地毯。 法雷尔称："如果厂商给产品变换一下名称并采取更佳方式进行推广，就会供不应求。"
对办事认真的能工巧匠来说，在家安装小便池是一个极好的项目。去年在密歇根州外Elk Rapids的约翰?谢菲尔德(John Shepherd)（与马克?谢菲尔德没有关联）希望在他家地下的10人家庭剧院安装某些独具特色的设施。这位52岁的网页设计师兼比萨饼店厨师花210美元从卫浴设备商店订购了一个小便池，并在墙后面安装了一个15加仑的压力水箱。（在现有住宅里安装此类设施，水压有时是个问题。）
他安装了一个电磁阀，将其与多年前花6.95美元在军需剩余物资店买来的Bendix旧开关盒相连接。之后他将盒子固定在小便池右上方。使用者若要迅速冲水，按下按钮即可，希望持续冲水可拉动木栓。两周后，谢菲尔德先生又在楼上安装了一个小便池。他说："这样真的很方便。"
在马里兰州的哥伦比亚，约翰?麦特兰德(John Maitland)称他的小便池很受"A.M. Wednesday"成员的欢迎。所谓A.M. Wednesday是每周去他家地下室聚会的小团体名字，约由25至30人组成。成员大多数是二战时的老兵，他们聚在一起喝著100杯量的壶冲出的咖啡，并聊上两个钟头，话题五花八门。75岁的麦特兰德总是向新成员展示他自行安装的小便池。 有些男士为安装小便池不惜投入重金。三年前，亚特兰大专业摄影师弗利普?查凡特(Flip Chalfant)在住宅的扩建部份中安装了家用小便池。这个垂至地板的装置安装在一块独立的空间里，天花板上带有平铺的拱形花纹，与住宅中其他建筑风格和谐一致。查凡特先生承认："花费有些超出了预算。"
