“As any experienced traveller knows,” Lonely Planet says in the book’s Introduction, “you can tell a whole lot about a place by its bathrooms. Whatever you prefer to call them – lavatory, loo, bog, khasi, thunderbox, dunny, washroom or water closet – toilets are a (sometimes opaque, often wide-open) window into the secret soul of a destination.”
“It’s not just how well they’re looked after that’s revealing,” Lonely Planet continues, “but where they are positioned and the way they’ve been conceptualised, designed and decorated. Toilets so often transcend their primary function of being a convenience to become a work of art in their own right, or to make a cultural statement about the priorities, traditions and values of the venues, locations and communities they serve.”
“In these pages,” Lonely Planet says, “you’ll find porcelain pews with fantastic views, audacious attention-seeking urban outhouses, and eco-thrones made from sticks and stones in all sorts of wild settings, from precipitous mountain peaks to dusty deserts”.
Lonely Planet’s Toilets: A Spotter’s Guide features:
- Oceania - From dusty dunnies in the Outback to New Zealand’s arty lavatories, there’s something for everyone in Oceania.
- Asia - Japan’s high-tech toilets get the attention but there are gas station gems in the Philippines and other Asian wonders here.
- Europe - The Old World has some new tricks with amazing municipal facilities and inventive private loos all over the continent.
- The Americas - Restrooms, bathrooms: call them what you want, the Americas have stunning examples in the wild and in urban environments.
ABOUT THE BOOK
Lonely Planet’s Toilets: A Spotter’s GuidePublished 12 April 2016
128pp, full colour, 180mm x 180mm, paperback with 90mm flaps
RRP: AU$14.99 / NZ$16.99
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