The Brilliant $15 Instagram Tool I Wish I'd Used to Paint My Bathroom

Paint is a great way to give any space in your home a whole new look, but the reality is that some rooms are easier to paint than others. Empty bedrooms with minimal millwork? Those are the easiest. And bathrooms, where you have to work in cramped spaces and frequently need to paint seemingly unreachable spots like the area behind the toilet? Those are among the hardest.

I’ve repainted two bathrooms in my home (you can see one of them on Apartment Therapy’s TikTok; here’s part 1 and part 2) and the absolute worst piece of each experience was contorting my body to try to paint the wall behind the toilet. I had some success with a long-handled mini roller, but the paint job still wasn’t perfect (and it still involved a fair amount of awkward angles). So when I stumbled on this reel from creator @taybeepboop, which shows off a brilliant painting tool for reaching tough spots, my jaw was practically on the floor.

Tay’s find is a tool aptly called the Paint Behind, and it’s available for $15 on Amazon. From the front, it almost looks like an icing spatula, especially as Tay spreads paint in the slim crevice behind the toilet. But the tool’s underside is entirely covered with short bristles. Cover those bristles in paint, and you’ll be able to coat almost any slim-fit spot. I would have loved to use this in my bathrooms behind the toilets, but it would also be great, as Tay notes, to paint behind radiators or other existing appliances that can’t be moved.

What really sold me were two things: One, the fact that the “brush” is replaceable, which means that even when the bristles have reached the end of their useful life you don’t have to throw out the entire tool. And second, the handle is extendable to 12 inches, which gives more flexibility as to where I can use it.

I wish I’d gotten wind of a tool like this before the last bathroom painting project I did — I might have avoided a lot of missed patches of wall (and day-after soreness) if I had. Adding it to cart for the next round!