We’ve got some news we’re proud to share: NW Homeworks won a 2026 Chrysalis Award for our Maple Leaf master bathroom remodel here in Seattle. It’s a national honor, and this is the project that earned it.
What’s a Chrysalis Award?
The Chrysalis Awards were established in 1993 to recognize the finest remodeling projects nationwide, highlighting professional excellence in both residential and commercial remodeling. Projects are submitted from across the country and judged by an independent panel on design, craftsmanship, and how well the finished space solves the problems it set out to solve. Winners get written up in Qualified Remodeler magazine, in both the print and online editions.
Our Maple Leaf master bath earned a Regional Award in the Bath Under $50,000 category, and that’s a bigger deal than it might sound. In each category the judges give out a single national award and only three regional awards for the entire country. We were up against entries from coast to coast, and ours was one of just those three regional winners. The national title in our category went to a firm in Columbus, Ohio, and we shared the regional honors with companies from Atlanta and the Boston area. For a Tacoma-based shop, that’s a result we’re genuinely proud of.
If you want the short version of why this one stood out, it comes down to what we started with: an empty attic.
The Project: An Attic With Nothing in It
When we started, this space was completely unfinished. No plumbing, no electrical, just raw framing and a sloped roofline. The homeowners are a growing family, and the goal was to carve a private primary suite out of that attic so the parents could have their own floor and free up a bedroom downstairs for the kids. The bathroom was the centerpiece, and the biggest challenge.
You can see the full before-and-after on the Maple Leaf master bath project page.
The Details That Won It
The finished room is what you notice first. A walk-in shower wrapped in deep forest green subway tile, a marble mosaic floor with radiant heat running underneath, and brushed brass fixtures and hardware throughout. Pulling finishes like these together in a room with sloped attic walls is harder than it looks. The tile has to meet cleanly at every angle, and the layout has to feel deliberate instead of crammed under the roofline. That attention to how the materials come together is a big part of why the space reads as calm and intentional rather than tight.
But the part judges tend to reward is the problem-solving you can’t see in a photo.
Getting utilities to an attic. Running new plumbing and electrical up to an attic wasn’t simple. Instead of tearing into the finished rooms below, we routed the supply lines, drains, and wiring down through an existing chimney chase to tie into the main lines and the panel in the basement. The living spaces underneath were never disturbed.
Beating the sloped ceiling. Headroom is the constant enemy in an attic, and the tightest spot in this one was over the toilet, right where the roofline drops lowest. We set a skylight into the slope directly above it, which buys back the height you need in the exact place the ceiling works against you. It also pulls daylight straight down into the room. That one move is what made the whole layout livable instead of cramped.
The mirror that floats over the window. We didn’t want to give up the window above the vanity, but keeping it left almost no wall for a mirror. So we mounted a standoff mirror that floats in front of the glass, centered over the vanity, with light passing around the edges. Small hurdle, but the kind of creative fix that keeps a room feeling polished instead of compromised.
What an Award Like This Really Tells You
Trophies are nice. What we like about this one is why it scored: the homeowners picked many of the finishes themselves, and our job was to take those choices and build a space around them that actually works. A remodel should feel like the people who live there, not like the contractor’s signature. This one does, and an independent panel of remodeling pros agreed.
If you’re planning a bathroom remodel in Seattle or the greater Puget Sound area, attic conversion or otherwise, we’d love to talk about it. Give us a call at (253) 448-9462 or reach out through our contact page.